Nigel and Tweets,

Glaucous gulls are not our standard gull around Anchorage;
they tend to be further north and west. If you go to Barrow,
they are the local "dump" gull. Our two big gulls are the
Herring and the Glaucous-winged and their hybrids. Our
small gulls are the Mew and, for a shorter season, the
Bonaparte's. I haven't gotten steeped enough in gulls to
judge degrees of hybridism, but I think one could see
many gradations here among the big gulls.

However, gulls of any type are scarce for Anchorage CBC.
They move out to the coastal areas in the fall. OK,
Anchorage is technically coastal, but the inlet we are
on turns into a bunch of silty ice blocks. Better to
wing on down to the Kenai Peninsula and get more
open water.

>It's great to read these birding lists from afar, but I was surprised that
there were no Glaucous Gulls on the Anchorage CBC. What is the mid-winter
distribution up there? And while I'm pushing for info, are there any tweets
who live in the breeding ranges of the glaucous x glaucous-winged, herring
x
glaucous-winged, or herring x glaucous pairs? Or any tweets who regularly
see the offspring?>

Chris Maack
Anchorage, AK
CMaack at compuserve.com