Yesterday I led a delightful group of 16 birders from ASGD's Master Birder class on a survey of gull viewing locations in south metro Denver. This is what we found:
1. Chatfield Res -frozen. No obvious gull flocks could be seen from the Audubon Society headquarters area, so we decided to skip this location. 2. South Platte Reservoir - A decent flock of gull was on the ice shelf, with several hundred birds. Highlights were an adult lesser black-backed gull (Plus another seen flying away after a Bald Eagle scared off half the flock), two Thayer's Gulls (one adult, one third-cycle), an adult California Gull, about twenty Herring Gulls of various ages, and a candidate immature Kumlien's Iceland Gull (better photos needed). Birds were a bit too far away for great looks, even through high-powered telescopes. Three continuing Long-tailed Ducks were a big bonus here. 3. Cherry Creek State Park ($8 entrance fee) Marina-A small group of 50 gulls gave us closeup views of adult and first-cycle Ring-billed Gulls, two 2nd cycle and three adult Herring Gulls, and a first cycle Thayer's Gull. 4. Cherry Creek State Park Smoky Hill Picnic Area-a break in the ice featured a large flock of common Merganser. A good sized flock of gulls sitting on the ice shelf contained >100 Ring-billed Gulls and five Herring Gulls. 5. Aurora Reservoir ($10 entrance fee). About 100 Ring-billed Gulls and 3 Herring Gulls were viewed at a great distance on the north side. 6. Late in the afternoon a few of us returned to South Platte Reservoir. The gulls were numerous and closer but variety was low- hundreds of Ring-billed Gulls and about 25 Herring Gulls. Eventually as the sun set an adult Thayer's Gull appeared and then a probable 2nd-cycle Nelson's Gull (hybrid Glaucous x Herring). As I was leaving after sundown, the gulls were flying off toward McLellan Reservoir. Nick Komar Fort Collins CO Sent from my iPhone -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Colorado Birds" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cobirds/8CD4D5AB-9258-432C-940A-F9FAF511CB04%40comcast.net. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
