Hi Tweeters,

About a month ago, I remember Michael Price, I think, commenting on an
influx of both Eurasian Wigeons and California Gulls into southern BC that
occurred annually in late winter. He also commented that the new
additions to the local CaGu population were alternate plumaged birds.

I visited Golden Gardens park in Seattle soon after that, and noticed that
the local flock of panhandling/loafing Glaucous-winged Gulls, Western
Gulls and mixed up inbetween gulls had changed both in size and
composition. In particular, whereas there had been only one "good"
Western Gull in the flock in December, there seemed to be half a dozen or
more in early February. The flock seemed larger by about 50%, too,
although I hadn't counted individuals in December. I am aware of how
local gull flocks can vary tremendously in winter depending on how the
gulls decide to forage during a particular day, week, or month, so I
thought I would put the question to tweeters: besides what Michael Price
has already reported for California Gulls in BC, do you notice any
consistent changes in the size and composition of gull flocks in the
winter months?

A couple other comments/questions:

The WEGUs in this flock were consistently *smaller* than the average
Glaucous-wings in the same flock. Noticably so. I had never heard that
there might be size differences between the two species - is there one?
Perhaps female Westerns are more likely to stray from the coast into
Puget Sound and Seattle? All the identifiable Western Gulls in question
were adults.

Also, I notice that more than half of the Glaucous-winged Gulls I've seen
in the past two weeks in Ballard and West Seattle are completely or
mostly white-headed. So the pre-alternate molt occurs around here pretty
early compared to what I was led to expect from Grant's gull book. I
don't have the book in front of me, but I believe he shows the typical
4-year gull starting its prealternate molt in March. The all white heads
actually made me do quite a few double-takes.

Finally got a good look at the shorebird flock at Alki Pt., and enjoyed
the several black turnstones and several dozen Surfbirds and Sanderlings
there this past weekend. Two weeks ago, two Common Murres were a
surprise to me there.

Chris Hill
Seattle, WA
cehill at u.washington.edu