[obol] One More Glaucous Gull & Areas Where They Weren't Today

[Cindy Ashy]

Meetings took me to various parts of Lincoln County today and in between I
birdwatched, mainly gull watched, in part to look for Glaucous Gulls. Sometimes
I think it is just as interesting to know where particular birds aren't found
so I'm going to report that as well.

Roof of the Rogue - checked morning and mid-day...lots of gulls, no Glaucous.

Hatfield Nature Trail - late morning high tide...surprisingly few gulls, no
Glaucous.

Newport South Jetty - lunch time high tide and there were LOTS of gulls at the
gull puddle...found the previously reported 3 first winter Glaucous
Gulls...could not relocate the 3rd winter(?) one (if you see it, please post it
or email me)....found one gull much smaller than all the rest which I think was
either a first winter Mew Gull or a first winter Ring-billed Gull....after
studying my guides on these I tried to view the gull again but a dog scattered
them right at that moment...then just when I relocated it, a car drove through.
Grrrrr. Hopefully, it will be there tomorrow.

The Point at Yachats (Yachats State Park) - mid-afternoon, tide much
lower....scanned the gulls in the big lawn by the restrooms and on the rocky
shore....got down into the tidepools to get the sun behind me...no
Glaucous....HOWEVER, much later on a last minute whim to check again, found one
in the tidepools, got very close to it and I am sure it was a
Glaucous....plumage was slightly darker than the light one at the Newport South
Jetty but not as dark as the darker ones there (the darkness was mainly around
the eye)....very clear two-toned beak....dark iris....right size, etc...

Mouth of Yachats River - mid-afternoon with the tide low enough that I could
walk out and get really close looks at the gulls (from the south side of the
river). There were about 320 gulls, more than half were Mew Gulls but no
definitive Glaucous Gulls....there was one that may be a candidate for a
Glaucous hybrid of some kind....it had a pink and black beak but the black was
more extensive than the few Glaucous Gulls I've seen (and the illustrations
I've studied) and the line between the two colors was not well defined...if it
is a Glaucous, its a dark morph....so I thought well maybe an immature Thayer's
Gull....however, it was standing right beside a couple of Glaucous-winged Gulls
and it was at least as big as those....I stared at this gull for a long time so
I have a good "mentalgraph" if anyone has ideas on what it could have
been...and it's still bugging me so help would be appreciated.

Alsea Bay - late afternoon...cute little kingfisher sitting on the retaining
wall....not many gulls near the city park north of the wall, no
Glaucous...noted that most of the gulls in the bay were on the other side.

Port of Alsea - late afternoon...scanned all the gulls on the piers, no
Glaucous...there were way more gulls on the other side but too far to see the
details without a scope. By the way, this is a great birding spot in that you
get REALLY close looks at birds and in the afternoon the sun is behind
you....so close and with such good lighting that you can see the feet in the
water and even what the ducks are doing underwater when they dive. The lighting
was so good that the golden eye against the emerald green head of a male
Greater Scaup just sparkled...it was so beautiful....the colors popped out so
much, it almost didn't seem real. Lots of Hooded Mergansers, Surf Scoters, and
Black Turnstones too....and a very sweet male cat who likes to birdwatch that
has recently been abandoned and the locals are looking for a home for it if
you're interested.

Bayshore Drive to get a look at the other side of Alsea Bay - no Glaucous Gulls
but about 400 harbor seals and some of the gulls were still too far out to see
detail without a scope.

Seal Rocks - lots of gulls but too far away without a scope to see detail.

South Jetty (again) - after being frustrated with not being able to get close
enough to see the details of the gulls in other spots I gained a new
appreciation for just how good a spot this is for gull watching and birding in
general....you can get SO CLOSE and a great variety.

Cindy Ashy






 
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