Subject: Tokeland Aug 7th
Date: Aug 8 00:17:35 2004
From: SGMlod at aol.com - SGMlod at aol.com


Greetings All

Today, Bob Sundstrom, Greg Toffic, Chris (from MN), and I joined the crowd on
the outer coast. Ocean Shores was rather slow. Bottle Beach had a fair number
of birds, but nothing unusual beyond an alt plum DUNLIN.

The BLACK-TAILED GULL was NOT in evidence.
The FRANKLIN'S GULL was at Tokeland, at the pull-off along the rockwall as
you're heading out to the marina (near the Nelson's Crab, but not right there).
Look carefully on the mudflats.

About half-way between Tokeland and the Smith/North R. mouth, we had a few
gulls and Canada Geese congregating at a spot that, during winter, often holds
large numbers of dabbling ducks. We had two small gulls. They appeared similar
in size, but one was black on wings and back, excepting crisp pale edgings.
The cap was black and the dark side-of-neck stripe (buffy in a juv Bony) was
blackish. The bird looked like a perfect juv LITTLE GULL, but we were baffled by
the lack in size difference. Also, Bob noted that there was dark along the
trailing edge of the upper wing seen during brief flight views, which seemed to
be a Bony-only mark.

Due to lack of sufficient resources, we didn't call the bird on the spot,
though discussed it anxiously after we returned to the BT Gull spot.

Upon returning home, I accessed European guides and the "recalled" Gull book.
Photos in the Gull book show a dark trailing edge to the wing of a juv Little
(albeit not as sharp as that of a Bony).During the brief flight view, I got
almost no look on the upper surface of the wing, but a fair view of the
undersurface which showed no translucence in the primaries (as a juv Bony should)
and showed a narrow black trailing edge to the primaries only-- good for juv
Little Gull (Juv Bony should show a dark edge to the entire trailing wing).
Additionally, bill measurements between the two species show considerable overlap
within the imm age group, and the wing lengths, etc closely approach each
other, allowing for the possibility that a single Little Gull and a single Bony
might look similar in size.

I've seen thousands of juv Bony's without ever seeing one that approached
this bird's plumage and it looked identical to the couple juv Little Gulls I have
seen. I have no doubt this bird was a Little Gull.

Cheers
Steven Mlodinow
Everett, WA