NYSbirders, Chris Wood, Marshall Iliff, and I birded north to south on the Niagara River in New York yesterday with the following highlights: 1 Cackling Goose - flyover with Canadas coming into NY from Ontario at Lewiston docks 1 Black-headed Gull - at the Lewiston docks, an adult about halfway done molting in hood (most Bonaparte's appear to still be in basic plumage, nice for picking this one out in addition to wing pattern, size, etc) 20-26 Little Gulls - in Lewiston from a few vantages (including the docks); we observed 13 Little Gulls twice at different locations, and feel that while there might have been some overlap, most of the birds were different and that there were at least 20 birds present.
We also saw 6 "Kumlien's" Gulls and 1 Glaucous Gull on the river from various points, though large gull numbers are way down and Ring-billed and Bonaparte's Gulls are dominating the river at the moment. We did drive down to the fishing access on the NY side at the Robert Moses/ Adam Beck power plant (just outside of the security entrance to the plant)- it seems that if the gate to the fishing access elevator is ever opened (it is "temporarily closed" now), the views from river-level on the New York side of the river could be spectacular, and identifications of tricky gulls could be more easily verified and supported than they can be from on high at the Sir Adam Beck overlook on the Ontario side of the river (where viewing is frustrating at best). Has anyone explored this access option further? Cheers, Tom -- Thomas Brodie Johnson Ithaca, NY t...@cornell.edu mobile: 717.991.5727 -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
