Subject: [Tweeters] Ring-billed Gull emulating a falcon?
Date: Wed Oct 7 21:37:06 PDT 2020
From: Gary Bletsch - garybletsch at yahoo.com

Dear Tweeters,
Today (the seventh instant) at Jensen Access, Skagit County, there was a small flock of American Pipits, plus a lone Barn Swallow. An immature (second-year?) Ring-billed Gull made at least three attempts to catch one particular pipit in mid-air. I don't recall seeing a gull make such a determined attempt to catch a flying bird. The pipits were fifty to sixty meters off the ground, and the gull would fly after one of them, the same individual each time, and make a sudden lunge at the songbird. The pipit seemed to evade each attack with ease, simply dropping at the gull's approach. Then the gull would make a ponderous series of manoeuvers in order to prepare for the next onslaught. After the third attempt, the gull flew off in one direction, the pipits and the swallow in another. The entire episode lasted perhaps two minutes.
Other fun birds today included a Bonaparte's Gull at Jensen, plus two Great Horned Owls and a Barred Owl at the Fir Island Game Range. Steve Pink alerted me to the presence of nine Greater White-fronted Geese that were loafing at Fir Island Farm Reserve, along with a big flock of Cackling Geese and Snow Geese.
It is time to start studying the blackbird flocks, in search of Rusty Blackbirds! I observed big blackbird flocks in the Cedardale area and on Fir Island. Some of the flocks included Brown-headed Cowbirds. The male cowbirds are now in an interesting state of moult, looking quite patchy. A Merlin made a strafing run at one of these flocks, but had no more success than the gull had had earlier.
Yours truly,
Gary Bletsch
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