Fun in the sun.

Today started with a nice drive around the Luther Marsh area and even though it was really cold I was able to find a lot of wildlife. It started with some northern shovelers, green-winged teals, american widgeons and some northern pintails. I also spotted a northern shrike and three sandhill cranes. Near the end of my time out this morning I found a field that had three northern harriers in it. There were two females and one first year male. This was a new area for me and it is very exciting to learn another location where these guys live.

Later in the afternoon we decided to head up to Collingwood to see what we could find and along the way we found three wood ducks (two males and one female) in the river at Horning Mills. Once we got to Collingwood we went down to the harbor and there we ending up finding a type of seagull that we have never seen before. Other than the obvious size differences in the species, there are a few other clues to look for to help tell these guys apart. In the picture I took I captured not only the new species up front but I placed a more commonly known ring-billed gull in the background for comparison. The picture is of a Thayer's Gull and you can see they have pink legs and feet instead of yellow and these guys have brown eyes instead of yellow. This gull is a rare visitor from October to May. I have never really looked for differences in gulls so it was neat to find out the different types.