Dear Fellow Birders Seabrooke Leckie and I were up at the south end of Owen Sound around 8pm yesterday and noted a large movement of almost entirely Herring Gulls flying north in large flocks. I made two one minute counts to get an idea of how many birds were passing by, the first one had about 165 birds/min, and the second had about 110 birds/min, though it was quite dark out and I have a feeling I was missing a few birds. I would have guessed an average of about 150 birds/min, which means over the 25 minutes I was there, approx. 3750 birds would of gone by. I would imagine that birds would have been passing by in these large numbers at least a half hour before and after sunset, meaning around 9-10,000 Herring Gulls would have migrated north in this period. I haven't seen gull numbers like this except for maybe along the Niagara River.
Mike Boyd Guelph, Ontario Mike Boyd <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Visit http://www.ofo.ca/ontbirdsguide.htm for information on leaving and joining the list. As well as general information and content guidelines.
