Gulls in the Rain - St. John's

[brucema...@gmail.com]

Constant solid rain from dawn to near dusk in St. John's meant there was not much one could do outside the vehicle (a crippled one at that!). There were lots of gulls to look at QV Lake.

Lancy and I looked at the gulls around QV Lake, golf course etc 07:30 to about 10:00. None of the rare gulls were seen. I was back again 13:30 to 15:30

- QV lake Baseball Diamonds, several thousand of gulls at dawn and many hundreds in afternoon.
- Bally Hally Golf Course 1000+ on each visit
- bare fields near entrance to dump max 2500 gulls
- QV lake just a few hundred but mainly the big gulls, i.e. GLGU GBBG

CREAM of the CROP

Lesser Black-backed Gull - at least 8 adults and 1 1st winter bird.
hybrid gulls - none

Pretty thin cream = <0.05 %. Still feel the Slaty-backed Gull is in there somewhere.

Black-headed Gull at QV and St. John's harbour - 2 (1ad, 1 1st winter)

OTHER BIRDING

BRANT hunt - searched for the two Brant from Chamberlains to Kelligrews and back no sign.

Black-headed Gull - 13 at Chamerlain's sewer outflow and beach.

Wigeon at Bally Hally Golf Course - at least 8 of 34 wigeon were Eurasian. Only one an adult drake.

Checked Neville's Pond without any surprises. No wigeon this time.


B Mactavish and for morning Lancy Cheng.

[pdli...@gmail.com]

I checked the QV baseball diamond from about 11:00 - 13:00 with nothing to add. Lots of gulls coming back and forth.
Also couldn't find the Brant. Tide was real high at the time.
Had 20 BHGU at Chamberlain's a couple of days ago.
Might do a vigil at QV today in an effort to find the Slaty-backed.
Paul

[Bill MacKenzie]

Thought I'd take another look for the two Brant in CBS after seeing Bruce and Paul's comments from yesterday. I found them at Chamberlains Pond this morning, visible from the south side of the pond (i.e., the very end of Chamberlains Road) looking north across the pond. They were feeding on the grass with the black ducks to the right of the NEW condo building (not the condos near the soccer pitch.)

[AlvanBuckley]

Thanks Bill,

Brant were exactly where you described.
They were Vernon's 200th species for the province! :)

Also an American Coot and 4 scaup on the pond.

AB

[brucema...@gmail.com]

Yah - I looked from the north edge of the pond southward toward some lawns sloping into the pond and there were Black Ducks grazing on the grass. Didn't realize there were other sloping lawns I couldn't see on the same side of the pond I was standing on. Later!

B Mactavish

[pdli...@gmail.com]

And the coot and scaup have been there since at least Nov 29.