Subject: Lake Sammamish midge swarms; gull feast
Date: Jan 7 17:21:41 2003
From: Li, Kevin - Kevin.Li at METROKC.GOV


I spent a long day on Lake Sammamish today, and saw more birds than I've
ever seen there in my 12 years of regular water quality sampling. Most were
ring billed gulls, and I would estimate conservatively that there were 2000
feeding on a very impressive hatch of midges. The gulls were mostly
dabbling, but frequently I saw them feeding on the wing, almost hovering and
snagging nearly invisible prey. Winds were non-existent all day, and midges
could be seen all over the water's surface and on the boat and on us. Coots
and buffleheads were in typical abundance toward the north end, but the
thousands of ring billed gulls were about a third of the way up from the
boat ramp. They were quietly scattered over a very large area, with food in
great abundance. Nearly all were on the water itself, taking advantage of
the hatch.

Kevin Li
Ballard, USA
kdli at msn.com
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