Crazy Gulls!

      Last Wednesday, Andrew Burnett came up from Neosho County to bird the Reno Co landfill.  He had what he thought was an Iceland Gull, a possible California Gull, and another first cycle gull he thought might be a Western.  He emailed Joseph, who went over right away with Anthony and managed to confirm that there was indeed a first cycle California and an intermediate Thayer's/Iceland Gull, which we still aren't convinced on either way.  They couldn't find the possible Western.  He did find a first cycle Great Black-backed Gull at the sandpit!

Good looking first cycle Great Black-backed!  Photo by Joseph

First cycle California.  It is the dark one close to the middle.  Photo by Anthony

Unfortunately, I couldn't go that day and when Joseph and I went the next day we didn't see any of the rarities.  As a consolation, we did have our highest count for Glaucous Gulls in one day, with three individuals!

This hulking first cycle Glaucous really stuck out!

On Saturday, Mark Land came down from Overland Park and together we went to check on things again.  We checked the sandpit first and refound the first cycle Glaucous along with a Thayer's.  Next, we headed over to a wheat field across from the landfill where several thousand gulls were loafing.  Before we even got out of the car I spotted a large black backed gull and let everybody know that there was either a Great Black-backed or a Slaty-backed out there!  We got out and put Mark's scope on it and it turned out to be a Great Black-backed!  That means there were two individuals there within three days of each other!  Not bad for review list birds!

Unfortunately, the Great Black-backed was far enough away that we could only manage trashy pics.

The gulls were far enough away that we decided to head on over to the landfill.  We pulled in and asked where to park, and they told us to go over right beside the fence.  After about fifteen minutes, we saw a first cycle California, but unfortunately it was right behind the fence.  We did get great binocular views, just not pics.  It was probably the same one that Joseph had on Wednesday.

We also refound the same gull we had seen on Christmas day, one that we thought might be a Cook Inlet Gull (Hybrid Herring x Glaucous-winged.)  When we sent it to the experts, there were varying opinions.  Several thought it was a Cook Inlet while one thought it was a normal Thayer's.  Oh, the joy of gulls!

Mystery Gull.

This first cycle Thayer's made several close passes by the vehicle, so I just had to snap a few pics.

On Wednesday, Joseph and Anthony had 7 species of gulls and when we went on Saturday we got that many again.  Those are our best single day gull species counts ever!  I thought that since this winter was warmer we might have a bit of a down gull year, but I was wrong!

Andrew

Gulls are back!

The gulls have come back, and we are very glad about that!  Our family gathering on Christmas day was near the landfill, so some of us cousins headed down to a wheat field where the gulls were milling.  There were roughly 2000 sitting about a hundred yards off the road, and we could scope them very well.  The highlight was a first cycle Glaucous, a major nemesis for Joseph, that showed up after about an hour.  We also saw a gull that doesn't seem quite right for any particular species.  There is a possibility that it is a Cook Inlet (Herring x Glaucous-winged) which would be very rare, although I did see one at the sandpit nearby last winter.

First cycle Glaucous Gull

Thayer's Gull wing pattern.

Possible Cook Inlet Gull.  What are your thoughts?

Possible Cook Inlet Gull.  Thoughts?

Bryant and I made a run to the landfill again today.  We had a third cycle Thayer's, something we Kansans don't see very often, an adult Glaucous, and 6 Lesser Black-backeds, our best count for this winter so far.

Poor pic of the adult Glaucous.

Adult Thayer's Gull.

Adult Herring that flew right by the truck.

Hopefully we start to get some mega rarities soon!  

Andrew

The Hybrid Gulls of Winter 2014-2015

With gull season slowly heating up, I've been impatient to get out and spend some quality time with some larids. Unfortunately school has kept me too busy to do much birding, but I have gotten around reviewing some of our gull photos from last winter.

I meant to post a summary of the gulls we saw last year, but seeing that didn't happen I guess I'll  whack out a quick post detailing the hybrid gulls we found.

I was watching gulls at the sandpit on January 22 when I saw this gull whip by. I looked up, thought "Oh, just another Thayer's" and shot a quick pic. Glancing at the back of the camera I thought it looked a little odd, but promptly forgot about it...

 Until, on the 20th of February Bryant and Andrew came upon this gull at the landfill. From their photos, I immediately recognized it as either the same bird I had seen or a nearly identical individual. With their much better photos it seems clear that this is a "Nelson's" Gull, a hybrid between Glaucous and Herring Gulls

Photo by Andrew

 The unique primary pattern, with P8-P10 "slatyish" nearly to the base but P7 mostly pale was the first thing I noticed. This is quite different from both Herring and Thayer's, but apparently standard for a 4th-cycle "Nelson's."

Photo by Andrew

 Note the short primary projection, large, blocky head, high eye-placement, and thick bill, all pointing to Glaucous influence

This great comparison shot shows the large size and paler mantle color of the hybrid well in comparison with Ring-billed and Herring.
Photo by Andrew

In retrospect it seems pretty obvious, and I'm surprised I didn't notice it in the field.

Andrew was gull-watching on the 3rd of February when he spotted this unusual gull. He sent to a few gull authorities who agreed that it was a "Cook Inlet" Gull, a Glaucous-winged X Herring Gull hybrid.

Andrew also found this gull which didn't seem to tick all the boxes for any particular species. Our best guess is that this is another "Cook Inlet" Gull. This hybrid, originating in the Cook Inlet area of Alaska, has rarely been sighted east of the Rockies, and this seems to the first record of this hybid in Kansas.

Anyway, hopefully we will get some good northern gulls here soon. So far this winter we have only found a few Thayer's and Lesser Black-backed.

Joseph

Cheney Comes Through!

Early on the morning of the 14th, Joseph, Anthony, Bryant and I loaded up and headed out toward Cheney.  We went straight to Yoder Point, hoping to be there when the gulls headed out from the lake.  After some brief scanning of the usual gulls and waterfowl, Anthony noticed some large wading birds.   Upon closer examination with the scope, we could tell they were Whooping Cranes!  Neither Bryant or I had seen them in Reno before and they were also year birds for everybody!

That is what Whooping Cranes look like from 1 mile away.

We stayed there for about 45 minutes and had several nice flocks of Bonaparte's Gulls, year birds for Joseph.

From there we worked our way down to the dam, stopping at several points along the way.  We did not see much, but when we got on top of the dam we saw a vast swath of waterfowl far out on the lake.

That dark out there is all ducks!  This was only part of the flock.

We got as close as we could and started scoping.  The majority of them were Mallards, Redhead, and Scaup, but there were also good numbers of many other species.  When my turn at the scope came, I noticed two large Grebes in with the ducks.  They were Western/Clark's types, but before we could look closely at them a boat came and scared all the birds further out.   We managed to refind one of the Grebes, and after extensive viewing we were pretty sure it was a Clark's.  Unfortunately, separating the two is very challenging and we couldn't ever tell for sure.

This is the distance we were dealing with on the Grebes.

While we keeping an eye on the Grebe, I took a quick binocular scan around and almost immediately saw a Black Scoter!  A lifer for everybody!  It was swimming closer to us, but the the same boat that scared the other birds came by and scared it off.  I was pretty annoyed.

Black Scoter

Black Scoter: picture by Bryant.

We stayed and watched the Grebes for a while, hoping they would come closer.  Unfortunately, the occasional boat kept them a long way off.  As we were walking back to the vehicle, Anthony and Joseph noticed a swallow.  Any swallow is exceptional at this time of year, but the most expected would be a Tree Swallow.  It turns out that this was a Barn Swallow, about the third latest it has ever been seen in Kansas!

As we headed out we stopped at a couple more points and found a Winter Wren, a year bird for Bryant!

It felt good to have another really good day of birding since, none of us have had a good one for a while!

Since all the other pics in this post were terrible, I will throw this one to hopefully counteract that:)

Andrew

Cheyenne Bottoms on Thursday

When the cold front brought in the latest rarity at Cheyenne Bottoms, a Pomarine Jaeger, we (Andrew, Joseph, and I) purposed to go chase it the following afternoon if it was seen again.  Well, it turned up again on Thursday morning. And so, we did our duty and fulfilled our purpose.

We arrived at the Bottoms at about 1:30 to find the marsh bustling with bird activity.  We stopped at the observation tower just inside the entrance to get our bearings and scope the marsh a bit.  Our search turned up no large dark birds other than Great Blue Herons, Ibis, and Cormorants.  The Jaeger should have stuck out like a sore thumb.  We did, however, notice a couple of vehicles stopped beside the road up ahead.  After leisurely checking the swallows perched nearby for Cave Swallows (there had been one reported)  we made our way toward the parked vehicles.  After a short conversation with the owners, who happened to be Tom Ewert and Dave Klema, we discovered that the Jaeger had just disappeared out of sight over a dike about a mile out on the central lake.  If only we had hurried over there sooner, we would probably have seen it!  No matter, it could probably be seen from the other side of the dike, and thankfully the road went around the lake giving a view of both sides.  We headed out around the lake, stopping briefly beside a wounded Ring-billed Gull to snap a few pics, and scanning the air and water for a large dark bird (other than Great Blue Herons, Ibis, or Cormorants).  We did; however, manage to find a Neotropic Cormorant, posing nicely on a weed not far off the road.

Ring-billed Gull: photo by Bryant

Neotropic Cormorant: photo by Andrew

Part way around, we met up with Edward Raynor, who had just refound the Common Gallinule (another rarity reported recently).  He offered to try to help us refind it, as well as the Jaeger, and we took him up on it.  We followed him to look for the Gallinule, all the while keeping our eyes peeled for any sign of the Jaeger.  We found neither, and soon headed back around the lake check back where we started.  We had stopped to scan the water, when Andrew said, "I think I've got it!"  We all trained our binoculars on the distant speck.  It looked promising, but unfortunately, it was heading the other direction and soon disappeared from sight.  With our limited views- it was over a mile away- we weren't able to make a positive I.D. although we were all fairly sure that it had been the Jaeger.  Close call number two!

We continued back around the lake, stopping occasionally to scan.  While we did find a Least Bittern, several Buff-breasted Sandpipers, and two Sanderlings, all good finds; the real prize eluded us.  And our time was running out!  It was about 3:30, and we needed to leave by 4:00.  We stopped again (we were now back to where it had first been seen) to talk to some more birders, who told us they had seen the Jaeger about an hour ago from the same place.  It had been back while we were gone around the lake!  While I was still talking to them, Andrew, who had been scanning the lake, sounded the alarm.  Sure enough.  There it was in all its glory, floating on the water about 3/4 of a mile off the shore.  We soon had Edward's scope focused in on it, giving us beautiful looks.  It even took off for us several times, allowing us to see the diagnostic Pomarine paddle-shaped tail.

Pomarine Jaeger: photo by Andrew

Pomarine Jaeger, notice the odd paddle shaped protrusion for the end of the tail: photo by Andrew

What a great finish to a twitch!  It was very gratifying to finally see the crazy critter after several near misses!

Bryant

Hoskinson's Sandpit: April 7

Bryant had a piano lesson in town today, so I got to go to Hoskinson's Sandpit for about an hour and a half this afternoon.  Over the past several weeks we have seen a gradual increase in Franklin's Gulls and a gradual decrease in Ring-billed and Herring.  Today they were almost all Franklin's with only about thirty Ring-bills and no Herrings.  As I sat there I saw a small bird swimming away.  I looked over and it was an Eared Grebe, I was pretty pleased because it was only the second time I had ever seen one in Reno county.  It was also a pretty good year bird.

Eared Grebe 

 I walked around the sandpit and got my first of season Cliff Swallow along with a fly-over Osprey.  I started walking back and saw a Swainson's Hawk, I saw a pointy winged raptor flying behind it.  I looked at it and was amazed to see a Peregrine Falcon, which is a good bird at this time of year.  Unfortunately it was too far off to get any pictures, but it was a very neat bird!  As I walked back to where I would wait for Bryant, I saw a large bird fly out of a tree.  It was a Black-crowned Night Heron!  It circled back around and came by me so I could get some okay pictures.

Black-crowned Night Heron

 I then sat down to check out the Franklin's Gulls again in hopes of finding a Bonaparte's Gull.  After a little bit I saw two gulls flapping around and identified them as Bonaparte's.  To top it all of I had two first of year Purple Martins fly over, giving me year bird #140 in Kansas.  It was a gorgeous day to be out, but it was a bit warm.

Bonaparte's Gull  (center)

Cheney Lake

Today Bryant and I went to Cheney lake for several hours.  It was pretty calm which made the viewing for the ducks quite nice.  When we got to the dam, we started checking around the lake.  The whole lake was covered in ducks! Common Mergansers were the most common, but there was a nice variety of other diving ducks.  As we approached a group of several Ring-necked Ducks, Lesser Scaups, and Redheads, I saw one duck go flying away.  It had VERY distinct white wing patches and when it landed I saw that it had a white patch in front of its eye and another one right behind its eye.  It was a White-winged Scoter, a lifer for us!

White-winged Scoter: Photo by Bryant

Other birds of note included the following:  Field Sparrow, White throated Sparrow,  Lesser Black-backed Gull, and thousands of Common Mergansers. Undoubtedly though, the Scoter was the best bird of the day.

Andrew

Landfill Report: February 20

We (Bryant and I) went to the landfill yesterday and had a pretty good day. When we got there all the gulls were sitting a couple hundred yards away and were positioned straight into the sun. We were contemplating how long we should stay, when they started coming in towards the trash pile to eat. Soon we had a nice gathering of them in close, although the lighting was still poor.  There was eventually enough cloud cover that we could pick out a nice variety of gulls including the following: 15 Thayer's Gulls,  5 Lesser Black-backed Gulls,  2 Iceland (Kumlien's) Gulls, and 2 intermediate Thayer's/Kumlien's. We also had a possible Nelson's Gull (Herring x Glaucous). Thoughts on this bird?

Possible Nelson's Gull:  Photo by Andrew

Possible Nelson's Gull:  Photo by Bryant

1st cycle Kumlien's Gull:  Photo by Andrew

1st cycle Kumlien's Gull:  Photo by Andrew

Adult Thayer's Gull:  Photo by Andrew

  Andrew

Hoskinson's Sandpit Report: February 17

Today I went to the sandpit for about 3-1/2 hours.  When I got there it was fairly pleasant.  There were a lot of gulls loafing around about a hundred yards out and I saw a couple of adult Thayer's.  I was beginning to think that though there were chances of rain for the afternoon they might have been inaccurate, when Joseph called and said that "it's snowing and raining at our place and probably will be there soon.''  This inspired me to search for shelter, which I found in the form of a metal trailer of sorts.  It snowed for a little while and after it stopped I could look at the gulls again.  The same intermediate 2nd cycle Thayer's/Kumlien's that we saw on the 12th had flown in, but it was too far out to get more conclusive pictures.  The wind had really kicked up and was blowing very hard, making it very difficult to I.D. the sitting gulls.  After a while a bunch of gulls flew in and among the Herring and Ring-billed  I saw my first Lesser Black-backed of the day.  By now I was getting pretty cold so I called mom to see when she was coming by to pick me up.  She said it would be another hour.  Wow! By the time she got there I was really cold, and had only seen one more Thayer's as compensation.  Overall this was one of the worst days as far as gull numbers that I have had this year with only about four Thayer's, two Lesser Black-backed, and about five hundred of both Ring-billed and Herring.

Lesser Black-backed Gull.  Photo by Andrew

Andrew

Reno County Landfill report: February 12

 Bryant, Andrew and I spent the afternoon at the Reno County Landfill and the adjacent sandpit. We had, shall we say, an amazing time. We pulled up to the sandpit and carefully scanned the 1000 or so gulls sitting on the water. A 3rd cycle Lesser Black-backed was the only bird of interest for a while, but then Bryant spotted a very pale gull coming in. We looked at it carefully for the next few minutes and it concluded that it was probably a 2nd cycle Iceland. That would be the second one in three days! We moved around the sandpit and got better looks, though no good photos. It eventually flew off towards the landfill so we headed over there.

We promptly found several 1st cycle Thayer's and a few more LBBG of various ages. I happened to glance over at some other gulls and spotted a 1st cycle Kumlien's standing just a short distance away! We cautiously approached within about 20 to 30 feet and got some great photos before it flew off. Although we will have to find out for sure on the 2nd cycle, we probably had two Kumlien's Icelands in one day! This is still a review species in Kansas with only about fifteen previous records.

Note the pale, patterned tertials and white primaries

2nd cycle Kumlien's /Thayer's? Thoughts on the ID?

Other highlights were: 10+ Thayer's Gull (these really need to be taken off the eBird filter), 7+ Lesser Black-backed Gulls (2 adults, 1 4th cycle, 2 3rd cycles and 2 1st cycles), A hybrid type, possibly GBBG x HEGU or very atypical Herring, Both a Ring-billed and a Herring with one dark, presumably defective eye and one banded 4th cycle Herring (I didn't notice it till I checked my photos on the way home). A total of five gull species for the day, my personal record!

One of the many Thayer's Gulls.This one is perhaps a bit darker than typical.

3rd cycle LBBG

3rd cycle LBBG

Hybrid Great Black-backed x Herring or aberrant Herring? Your thoughts are welcome on this. Photo by Andrew

Hybrid Great Black-backed x Herring or aberrant Herring? Your thoughts are welcome on this. Photo byAndrew

Banded 4th cycle Herring Gull

 Joseph

First cycle Iceland (Kumlien's) Gull

Yesterday I went to Hoskinson's Sandpit in Hutchinson.  Upon arriving, one of the first gulls I identified was an adult Lesser Black-backed!  Over the next hour there was a constant stream of gulls coming from the landfill including a couple adult Thayer's.  I also had a Killdeer, which is the earliest I have ever had one.  During the last fifteen minutes that I could be there, I looked up and to my surprise saw a very pale gull flying over!  I quickly put my binoculars on it and saw right away that it was either a very pale Thayer's or a Iceland(Kumlien's).  I frantically took several pictures before it started to circle higher and higher.  I quickly called Bryant, who was at piano lessons in town, but it disappeared out of sight about two minutes before he got there.  We rushed over to the landfill, which was in the direction it had disappeared.  When we got there we scanned the sky, hoping to catch a glimpse of the gull.  We were beginning to despair when Bryant yelled," There it is!"  Sure enough, there it was, circling high over head.  It disappeared out of sight about a minute later.  When we got home we looked over our pictures, but we were not sure enough to call it a Kumlien's.  So we sent it to Jon King, the ebird reviewer, and he agreed that it is a Kumlien's!  This is about the fifteenth record for Kansas of an Iceland Gull.

Iceland(Kumlien's) Gull

Iceland(Kumlien's) Gull

Andrew