ML63835711
Contributor
Date
Location
- Age
- Not specified
- Sex
- Not specified
Media notes
Photo courtesy of Janice House.
Observation details
Original observer: Janice House. First record for Muskoka. Source: Janice House pers. comm. 2013. The slender attenuated shape, black back, yellow bill with a red gonydeal spot, and yellow legs of an adult Lesser Black-backed Gull make it distinctive among the regularly occurring North American gulls (Howell and Dunn 2007). It was these features that drew Janice House’s attention on the rainy morning of 20 October 2013 as she watched fifty plus gulls in the field opposite her home on Doe Lake Road. In addition to the features above, House also noted that the gull was smaller than the Herring Gulls in the field, but larger than the Ring-billed Gull next to which it was standing. She went outside and approached the flock and observed the bird closely with binoculars. Realizing it wasn’t a Great Black-backed Gull she ran back into her home and managed to take a photo through her window, not wanting to scare the bird away. She confirmed the i.d. with field guides and got word out to other local birders, but the flock had flown off to the southwest by the time they arrived. Despite extensive searching of gull hotspots in the Gravenhurst area, including the landfill and the McDonald’s parking lot, the bird could not be refound. Although a visitor from Europe, this gull is becoming an increasingly common fall and winter bird in eastern North America, with high counts of 100+ birds occurring from Massachusetts south to Florida (Howell and Dunn 2007). As well, summer records are increasing. On 11 July 2014, 26 birds were observed on Lake Michigan in Wisconsin (www.anythinglarus.com). It is rare to locally fairly common in the southern Great Lakes region and sightings have occurred across southern Ontario and east to the Ottawa area (Pittaway and Iron 2012; Howell and Dunn 2007; eBird data). In the two week period prior to House’s sighting, birds were seen just to the south in Simcoe County. On 8 October 2013, Chris Harris saw two birds at Kempenfeldt Bay (eBird S1536384), and on 18 October 2013, Josh Vandermeulen and Dave Szmyr saw an adult bird at Innisfil Beach Park (eBird S15436263).
Technical information
- Model
- Canon PowerShot SX120 IS
- ISO
- 400
- Focal length
- 60 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire, auto
- f-stop
- f/4.3
- Shutter speed
- 1/160 sec
- Dimensions
- 3648 pixels x 2736 pixels
- Original file size
- 1.42 MB