Subject: Re. juvenile gulls/yellowlegs
Date: Jul 28 23:24:30 1995
From: Jack Bowling - jcbowling at mindlink.bc.ca



On July 28, Al Jaramillo said:

> Yesterday I saw a juvenile Lesser Yellowlegs here in Half Moon Bay,
>San Mateo Co, California. I looked up the early juvenile date in Dennis's
>book and this one beats it by one day. Given that I am quite a bit further
>south, it seems to be a pretty early record. Have others been seeing
>juvenile yellowlegs already? BTW, the Lesser Yellowlegs is a relatively
>uncommon shorebird here.

And then Michael Price wrote:

>In Vancouver BC, Deborah Kerr & Jim Morrison found couple of juv LEYE in
>the Jericho Ponds yesterday the 27th, and I saw a pair on Spanish Banks
>earlier in the morning, perhaps these are the same two birds, as a bunch of
>kids swept the foreshore pretty clean and a *ton* of birds flew to the east.
>Vancouver BC average juv arrival of LEYE is July 25. I wonder sometimes if
>they don't arrive from the west as a wave more or less simultaneously along
>the coast.

Seeing as how Lesser Yellowlegs are *probably* breeding somewhere
around the Prince George area (yet to be confirmed), it is amazing to
annually witness the incredible buildup of young yellowlegs around the
third week of July here. A favoured lakeshore can go from token
numbers of locally produced young Greater Yellowlegs to scores of
young Lessers within a few days. I think most of these are arriving
from North of 60 on their way south. But likely a few are also finding
their way in from the swamps near Prince George, too. I would find it
hard to believe that a yellowlegs wave could originate from any
quadrant other than the north in this part of the world.

,Jack



Jack Bowling
Prince George, BC
CANADA
jcbowling at mindlink.bc.ca