My son and I spent a couple cold hours at the Stanwood Sewer Ponds this
afternoon (hoping to add Tropical Kingbird to our sewer pond list by spying
it at Donna's house from the sewer pond dike). As we parked, the first bird
we saw was a peregrine sitting on top of the Hamilton Lumber smokestack. We
watched it make two unsuccessful hunting attempts, one of them coming right
at us from the top of the smokestack and about 15 feet over our heads at
high speed. Its 3rd attempt was successful, at the south end of the large
pond. We stood and watched through our scope as it ate the breast and neck
of a hen mallard. It was still alive and flapping its wings as it's head
was neatly removed.

There were a couple hundred gulls sitting around. Mostly Glaucous-winged,
but a fair number of ring-billed, and a few mew. In addition there was one
gull which I did not recognize. We got good looks at it only sitting, and
it flew just as I was about to photograph it. We could not relocate it.
Size appeared to be just a tiny bit smaller than the Glaucous-winged gulls.
Definitely larger than the ring-bills. It was an adult bird. The striking
feature was orange legs and bill. I might go pinkish-orange, but more
orange than pink. The bill and legs were the same color. Back was dark
(slaty). There were black and white wing tips. Top of the head and back of
the neck were slightly streaked (smudgy). Chest and belly were white. The
iris was light. The tip of the upper mandible was yellow, as opposed to the
remainder of the bill being orange. There was a reddish spot near the tip
of the lower mandible only. The bill looked to me to be about the same size
as the glaucous-winged bills nearby.

Sibley says that the legs of slaty-backed gull are often bright pink.
These were more orangish, and the slaty-backed bill in the field guides is
yellow, not orange. Any ideas?

Dan Logen
Stanwood