Washington birders may be interested to know that an immature Great
Black-backed Gull was found in Boise, ID in December and remained for
several weeks. This was the first state record for Idaho which I also
presume is the case for the WA bird (although that has not been mentioned on
tweeters). There are pictures of this bird available on the IBLE web site at
groups.yahoo.com. Accessing the pictures requires being subscribed to IBLE
although I presume the pcitures could be made available (by email or posted
to another web site) if there was the interest. The pictures are a bit dark
but it would be interesting to compare the 2 sightings if possible. One
could imagine this bird traveling down the Snake (from Boise) to the
Columbia R. and eventually to the Puget Sound (a long, circuitous route, but
at least possible). Several years ago, adult Lesser Black-backed Gulls were
reported in Boise, Clarkston, WA (Snake R.), and Walla Walla, WA (Columbia
R.) I believe in the same winter.

Of course there could have been some other phenomenon that caused several
Great Black-backed Gulls to move west this winter or it could be mere
coincidence. This species has been reported in recent years in Colorado
although when I checked in December there were no records for Utah,
California, Oregon, and at the time Washignton.

thanks, Charles.

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Charles E. Swift
Moscow, ID, USA
charless at moscow.com
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