Results from the Morocco expedition

After we came home from Morocco and got used to -10 degrees and snow, the long dark evenings was used to punch the gull readings in excel. This work was more extensive than expected, which of course is most joyful. The total number of readings was about 735 of 367 different individuals. The e-mails with observations are at the moment sent to the different project managers and we are really looking forward to get the life histories and ringing informations. When this information is received and we have done some computing we will give a summary of the results as a post on this blog! The summary for the different 'countries' are as follows:

Country	Observations	Number ind.
Norway	231	99
The Netherlands	150	79
England	80	38
Belgium	71	37
Denmark	54	28
Spain	28	28*
Guernsey	25	10
Scotland	19	8
France	17	6
Germany	14	6
Iceland	9	4
Portugal	4	1
Sweden	1	1**
Unknown	32	22

*27 Audouin's Gulls and one Black-headed Gull
**Reading of metall ring

The species was dominated by Lesser Black-backed gull (Larus fuscus) followed by Audouin's Gull (Larus audouinii)

Species	Observations	Number ind.
Lesser Black-backed gull	706	338
Audouin's Gull	27	27
Mediterranean Gull	1	1
Black-headed Gull	1	1

We will end this blog with a picture of the reading that in our opinion was the best for us. This male Lesser Black-backed Gull JA8K was ringed on top of the Science building at University of Bergen. He incubated on three eggs but we do unfortunately not know who his girlfriend is. If he stick to her one more year we hopefully get more information in 2013. This picture was taken on the last observation date in Bergen 20th of August 2012.

Norwegian invasion in Anza

This morning we decided to start in Souss which turned out to be a waste of daylight. The best place on this site was partly made into a new road and reduced in size. We did not see any Lesser Black-backed Gull sitting, the few we saw was flying over. We quickly changed the plan and went straight to Anza. We arrived around 08:30 and before one hour had gone, over 20 different Norwegian ringed gulls had been seen. In the end of the day the number of gulls with Norwegian origin was impressive 52 different birds. This number is new high of Norwegian LBBGs recorded in Morocco in  a single day! The previous record was 48 from 27.01.2009 when two different teams were here. The total number of Norwegian ringed LBBGs on our trip is now 86. The total number of rings read today is between 150 and 160. Today the first urban gull ringed in Bergen appeared in Anza, finally! After almost 40 hours in the fish odor in Anza, J8Y0 was sitting on the beach. Another bird we appreciated was J4Z3, which we saw in one of our urban lakes in Bergen earlier this spring. This bird was ringed at Karmøy south of Bergen by Karmøy ringing group.

A local man in Anza came with these rings to us and told us he had found them on dead gulls on the beach. We will report them to the correct ringing scheme when we come home.

JR2Y is ringed as a pullus in Troms by Morten Helberg in 2012.

2.VO is ringed by Paul Veron on Guernsey

Yet another day in Anza

As the two previous days, we followed the same schedule and took the beach in Agadir from 07:00 to about 08:00 and the rest of the day in Anza. As you can see from the pictures below the number of gulls were fantastic. It's almost impossible to estimate numbers. The total result was a bit lower than the previous days with around 130 readings. Of these 41 had Norwegian rings which is a new high for us on this trip. This means that over 1/3 of the Lesser Black-backed Gulls with rings in Anza are ringed in Norway. On our three days in Anza we have also experienced that the time between 16:00 and dusk is the time many new gulls come to feed, especially adults. Some of the old ones have only been seen briefly during these hours. The bird on the picture above (JP2R) ruled the river with fish remains Anza. It was ringed at an island south of Mandal this year by two of the persons responsible for the domination of Norwegian rings in Anza today, Morten Helberg and Finn Jørgensen. We also had two other birds ringed on the same island on the same day, which is impressive!

Our view in Anza today, really impressive numbers of gulls

This first year LBBG 4AP5 is ringed by Paul Veron at Guernsey

J271 is ringed in a fuscus fuscus colony in Northern Norway and could possibly be and individual of this subspecies which has a western wintering site.

V.R6J is ringed in Denmark

Anza delivers again

Yesterday evening the plan for this day was already set. Agadir beach in the morning and the rest of the day in Anza. We followed this plan and got awarded with around 130 readings of Lesser Black-backed Gulls (Larus fuscus).  Some of these are the same as yesterday, but not as much as expected. The turnover of gulls in Anza is large and we think that even after 22 hours spent in Anza, tomorrow will give us new birds. We have summarized the Norwegian birds and we have got a total of 55 different LBBGs! Two of todays highlights were a leucistic Lesser Black-backed Gull and the long awaited own ringed LBBG. 10 minutes before dusk J3Y5 was sitting in the dirty water coming out of the fish factory. This bird is ringed as a pullus in 2010 in our monitoring colony at Lyngøy in Hordaland. It was also seen in Blaringhem in France by Harry Vercruijsse earlier this year.

Leucistic Lesser Black-backed Gull

905N from France

JV4C ringed as a first year bird in Kolbotnvannet, Norway

J0K6 ringed as pullus in Lindesnes, Norway has lost a foot

5.M is one of 16 different birds we have read from this project.

J3Y5 the long awaited own ringed LBBG from Lyngøy

Crazy day in Anza

The first day in Agadir started before dusk and ended in dawn after gull watching in 11 hours. We stared on the beach in Agadir and quickly got ten readings before people, and dogs started their morning  exercise. The next 10 hours was spent in Anza where the gulls was numerous today. In total we read around 140 different Lesser Black-backed gulls (Larus fuscus) including 39 from Norway. One of the highlights was JU04 which we also saw in Anza this spring and found in May at our local site on the island of Fedje. Today this bird was once more sitting in Anza eating the fish remains from the fish factory in Anza. Hopefully tomorrow will give us even more readings. We end this post with some pictures.

T.4 probably from The Netherlands

JH9N ringed by Morten fuscus Helberg in Mandal this summer.

V4TC ringed by Pedersen in Denmark

Some are more colour full than others like this one, E and F85

1U9:C the ringing country is unknown for us

Finally arrived in Anza

After 16 hours of travel from Bergen via Oslo to Marrakesh and the two hours drive over the High Atlas to Agadir we finally arrived in Anza, Agadir. Here we could enjoy thousands of gulls. We arrived 30 minutes before sunset and could see the huge swarms of gulls over the fishing port. When we arrived in Anza we estimated the number to be between 10.000 - 15.000 gulls, impressive! We put up the telescopes and it did not take long before we had the first ringed Lesser Black-backed gull (Larus fuscus). It was a white ring probably ringed in France. After it became to dark and we had to drive back to Agadir. Now we are really looking forward what tomorrow can bring.

Our Lesser black-backed gulls move southwards

Unfortunately we do not have picture of JA6V but JA5V was ringed next to it.

Yesterday (24th of September) Paul Veron reports that one of our Lesser black-backed Gull (Larus fuscus) pullus was seen in Guernsey. This is our first reading for a gull in the Channel Islands and very nice that is was a LBBG pullus where the colony of birth is known. The colony where it was ringed is a semi-urban colony at Ågotnes which is a large supply base for the oil industry in the North Sea. The person responsible for the security kindly gave us access to the whole base and on 12th of July the urban ringing team in Bergen (Christian Pedersen, Vegard Finset Fjeldheim and Arild Breistøl) with help of Bent Fjeldheim from Hallingdal ringing group (blog is in Norwegian) entered the area. We ringed 18 Lesser Black-backed (one of these with metal ring only) and 34 Herring Gull pullus this day. As the other colonies we visited this summer the production of Lesser black-backed was not to good, but the Herring gull production was what we think is a normal level. Since this was our first visit to the colony we do not know the production numbers exactly so the production estimates are uncertain. We also have another reading of a LBBG from this colony but this one have so far only moved to the city center park in Bergen.

JJ1V was ringed in the semi-urban colony at Ågotnes 12th of July and seen for the first time in the city center of Bergen 5th of September. The 20th of September it was still present.

Since the Ågotnes colony is close to Bergen and reading with telescope don't seem to affect to birds much we visited the colony four times after ringing. Of the 17 LBBG pullus we ringed with colour rings 11 individuals (64 percent) has survived to fledging which is quite good. The observation in Guernsey was another confirmation of that the few LBBG pullus that fledged actually have survived.

Readings of Lesser black-backed gull pullus ringed in the colony at Ågotnes. JA6V has been seen 1309 kilometres south west in Guernsey and JJ1V in the city centre of Bergen.

A later post will summarise the colony at Fedje island which is a natural mixed colony of Herrings and LBBGs.

Some news and our first Gray Heron ringed

It's been a while since our last blog post, but our ringing activities are still continuing with the same strength. One of our target species this summer has been the Lesser Black-backed gull (Larus fuscus). The reason for this is mainly because of all observations outside Norway of the few LBBGs (9 adults and 13 1Y) we ringed last year. This year the numbers are much higher and so far we have ringed 79 fully grown LBBGs. The majority have been ringed in the Bergen city center, but we have also widen the horizon and ringed many breeding birds in the non-urban nesting colonies on the islands west of Bergen. In the colonies we visited the breeding success was low but we still managed to ring 59 nestlings in four different colonies. These days are exiting times, we get reports from Texel in The Netherland, France and Spain from birders who have spotted our birds.We are really looking forward to the autumn and winter months for more reports.

At the moment we try to ring as may first-year LBBGs as possible when they come to the parks to feed bread to fatten up for they journey south. The majority are quite easy to catch and we have reached 22 first-years as writing. Today we concluded that we had done a good job when almost every first-year LBBG we could find had a nice black ring around their legs. We therefore got time to ring some other species. One of the species we ringed was a first-year Gray Heron (Ardea cinerea) which was a new species for us. The story behind this bird was that it was found by the road in an island outside Bergen unable to fly and weak probably because of food shortage. It was transport to the friendly vets at Dyreklinikken Vest in Bergen who examined it and and feed it with cod. After a day and a night with care we could release it by a little lake in a park where we often see Gray Herons hunt for sticklebacks. We equipped it with a plastic ring and released it. In less then 20 minutes after release we could see it hunt for food and hopefully it will become strong enough to survive the winter.

The heron ringed with JE01 started to hunt for food shortly after release.

Large beautiful wings

Later we also ringed two first-year and one adult Coot (Fulica atra). The Coot have become a breeding  bird around Bergen in the last 20 years. This makes it extra interesting to ring this years production and the adults.

Latest activities and a Mew Gull that surprise us

There have been some time since our last post on this blog. The reason is not that we have stopped ringing gulls, rather the opposite the effort have been increased. In the one and a half month since the last post we have been focusing on ringing the Lesser Black-backed Gulls (Larus fuscus) breeding on the roofs in the city center of Bergen. At time of writing we have ringed 9 adults in urban Bergen and read seven of the nine adults ringed in 2011. The return rate are very impressive which inspire us to ring more. In addition to the urban ringing we started to do catching in a mixed colony of Herring Gull (Larus argentatus) and Lesser Black-backed Gulls in an industrial area 17 kilometers west of Bergen. So far this have resulted in 21 Herring Gulls and 5 LBGs. We have also had three very interesting readings of LBG's in this colony. One was ringed in Pitsea, England by Paul Roper's group, the second was ringed in Faro, Portugal after it was rehabilitated by the RIAS group. The third was a gull ringed as a chick 280 kilometers to the south outside Lista southwest in Norway. This bird had only been seen earlier in Algeria! We will write more about the work in this colony later.

Lesser Black-backed Gull F016 have returned to the breeding colony thanks to the RIAS rehabilitation centre in Faro, Portugal.

Today the the first 1Y Mew Gull (Larus canus) ringed in 2011 was read at River Severn, Gloucester, England. The special about this bird is that it was one of the easiest we ever have caught. We we gave out bread on a warm day in end of July 2011 this bird was almost running between our feet. We picked it easily up and put on a ring even though we expected close to zero probability that this bird would give a reading. The bird was very small and had a head and bill measurement of only 82 mm and body mass of 285 gram. When we released it it came right back to us begging for more bread. It remained in Bergen for about a week and continued to show the same unafraid behavior. This is the second of our first winter Mew Gulls to be read in Gloucester area the other is summarized here. Thanks to John Sanders for finding and reporting the this bird!

Mew Gull J9R6 was begging for more bread minutes after ringing and we are very pleased that it survived and hopefully will come back to breed on a roof in Bergen city center.

Welcome back...

21st of March the first Lesser Black-backed Gull (Larus fuscus) was back in the urban nesting colony at University of Bergen campus. Even if this individual isn't ringed, we believe this is one of the roof nesters because it rested most of the time close to one of last years nesting sites, it took bread and have remained at the site for two days now.

However, this is not the first LBBG in Bergen this year. The first was seen by Alf Tore Mjøs as early as 3rd of March when it rested briefly in the city centre lake. This is the earliest record ever in Hordaland county. The next individual showed up one week later (11th of March). Also this one just for a quick stop. At 21st of March the first two-digit numbers of LBBG seen here in Bergen was reported in the bird report system (Artsobservasjoner). The same day four was also observed in the city centre lake.

Now we are waiting for the first ringed LBBG to show up...

Moroccan dream...

Urban ringing in Bergen are at the time of writing at a gull expedition to Morocco. We have used the first two days reading gulls in Anza, Agadir and got around 50 different readings. This morning our dream comes true when JC5K ringed by us in Bergen 11th of September was eating fish waste in Anza. Our mission in Anza was complete and we headed southwards to Sidi Ifni. This small town between Tan-Tan and Agadir does not have a fish factory but still around 1500 Lesser blacked-backed gulls was seen. One of the birds was ringed by Alf Tore Mjøs i Stavanger. We have many other Lesser Black-backed readings and will send you information as soon as we get home to Norway!

JC5K in Anza, Agadir

1Y Lesser Black-backed Gull in Germany

The 23rd of October we had our first reading of a Lesser Black-backed Gull in Germany. For exactly one month ago this bird was ringed in the city center lake in Bergen. This J8Y4 was also our last LBG for the season. Most of the 1Y's LBG have now left Bergen, but yesterday (23rd of October) when reading gulls we found two struggelers which still have chosen to delay migration. One of these already has a ring and the other one has a limp so we do not want to put a ring on it. We have one reading of an adult LBG in England from earlier this season, read more here.

Germany is also the fifth country where gulls ringed in the city centre of Bergen are observed. A summary of last years results when we had four gulls observed in four different countries can be read here.

JC9K one of the Lesser Black-back Gulls who have chosen to stay late in Bergen

J8Y4 migration southwards

Ringing summary for September 2011

In September we ringed a total of 104 gulls. Most of them 1Y Mew Gulls which was really easy to catch on rainy days. 11 1Y Lesser Blacked-backed Gulls was also ringed before they migrated southwards. The number of Black-headed Gull is still low in Bergen this autumn. Our max. count is only 12 which explains the low number of ringed of the species this month. An urban ringed Great Blacked-backed Gull was our first, even if it was a very small one. The numbers is summarized like this:

Species	1Y	Sub adult	Adult
Mew Gull	77	0	3
Lesser Blacked-backed Gull	11	0	0
Great Blacked-backed Gull	1	0	0
Herring gull	7	2	1
Black-headed Gull	1	0	1
SUM	97	2	5

JC3K hopefully in Spain or Morocco now

Ringing summary for August 2011

A bit delayed, but here are the ringing summary for August. As table shows our focus has been 1Y Mew Gulls, most of these have been caught in Byparken (the city centre of Bergen) and Tveitevannet (a lake in one of the suburbs of Bergen).

Of the 26 1Y Mew Gulls caught the 20th of August weekend 53 percent was read in either Byparken or Tveitevannet a later date. After three weeks (the 12th of September weekend) 35 percent of the birds was still present and after one month (the 17th of September weekend) only 2 percent was present. The ringed birds are leaving the area and others arrive.

Our numbers for August are as follows:

Species	1Y	Sub adult	Adult
Mew Gull	41	4	2
Lesser Blacked-backed Gull	1	0	0
Herring gull	5	2	1
Black-headed Gull	0	0	1
SUM	47	6	4

The first reading of an urban Lesser Black-backed Gull

This week we got the first reading of an urban nesting Lesser Black-backed Gull outside Norway. The male (J7Y0) which nested on top of the physics building at University of Bergen was seen in at a Landfill site in Norfolk, Great Britain 10th of September.

J7Y0 was ringed in Bergen 28th of May this year together with Morten Helberg. Morten is one of the initiators of the Norwegian colour ringing program for gulls. He is also working on a doctor's degree on the Lesser Black-backed gulls.

J7Y0 nests on top of the physics building at University of Bergen.

J7Y0 was seen in Norfolk 10th of September

More Lesser Black-backs...

Heavy rain all day gave us an opportunity to go for more Lesser Black-backed gulls in the city center of Bergen. When it rains few people are out feeding and the gulls get desperate for food. Christian checked the conditions in the middle of the day and could report that the Lesser Black-backed gulls was behaving like pigeons and seemed to be very easy to catch. After work we decided to catch as may as possible and we was really satisfied to get hold of five 1Y's in just one hour. These numbers brings us to a total of 9 adult, 11 1Y and 3 pullus of 'urban' Lesser Black-backed gulls.

JC0K a large Lesser Black-backed male

JC1K the second Lesser Black-backed 1Y we ringed this year. It is still present and will possibly be for a week or two.

Last year we also did September catching of 1Y Lesser Black-backed gulls together with Frode Falkenberg. Frode together with Alf Tore Mjøs is probably the two ornithologists that have done most gullwatching in Bergen and are together the sole reason for why Bergen has been called the gull capital of Norway (will come back to their discoveries in a later blogpost). Anyway, last years September catching with Frode actually started the work on urban gulls in Bergen. Much because of the unbelievable good results our six birds equipped with plastic rings produced. During the autumn and winter we had four readings in four different countries, spanning from Denmark in north to Morocco in south. A result showing the increased recovery rate the plastic rings can give.

Reading Lesser Black-backed Gulls in Caleta de Vélez, Andalucía

The last week of august we were on vacation in Andalucía, southern Spain! Most for vacation but also trying to find some of our own gulls in Poerto de Malaga and Caleta de Vélez! We kindly got information about the best spots by a local gull watcher, Salvador García. The first day in Poerto de Malaga we found a roof full of Yellow-legged gulls and some Lesser Black-backed Gulls, but unfortunately none with color ring. We later discovered a huge flock which mostly seemed like Lesser Black-backed Gulls, but fences made it impossible to get close to them. We even asked the Guardia Civil to get access, but with no luck. We later got information from Salvador that one of our own Lesser Black-backed Gulls (J1Y2) nesting in a gull colony in Norway was seen in this area some days earlier. So close but...

The next location at Caleta de Vélez, close to Vélez-Málaga 20 minutes drive east of Málaga, was easier accessible. As all harbours these days this one also had fences but made in a way that a telescope and camera could see through without problems. Salvador had told us that this place was best in the evening when the fishing boats arrive with the catch of the day. This turn out to be exactly what happened, around six o'clock some hundred Yellow-legged Gulls and Lesser Black-backed Gulls followed the boats. When the gulls was finished eating they rested on roof-tops and on the ground in a closed part of the harbour. We used three evenings at this spot shown in the picture below.

We started to scan the gulls and did not use long time before the first Lesser Black-backed Gull with a plastic ring was spotted. The sight of a black plastic quickly made us think about our urban nesting ones home in Bergen, but this one started with 1 not the letter J and therefore ringed at Guernsey.

Paul Veron informed us that this adult male was ringed at Vale Marais, Guernsey 10.05.2010.

Some days later we read two other individuals ringed by Paul Veron

This adult male was ringed at Chouet Landfill, Guernsey 25.06.2011 and was seen on the island 07.08.2011

This adult female was ringed at Chouet Landfill, Guernsey 20.05.2011

We also found a gull ringed by Roland-Jan Buijs's group in the Netherlands.

Roland-Jan Buijs informed us that this adult female was ringed at Europort outside Rotterdam 19.05.2011

...and two blue plastic rings probably from Iceland

Y272

YK71

...and finally a gull from Norway. It's was not a surprise to find that it was ringed in a colony not far from Mandal as most norwegian Lesser Black-backed Gulls have got their plastic here.

This individual was ringed as pullus 12.07.2002 at Storøy south of Mandal. In May 2010 it was observed in a breeding colony at Rauna not far from Lista Bird Observatory. The last two winters it has used Puerto de Málaga as wintering site. Maybe this year too, watch out for it Salva :)

We also read some Audouin's and Yellow-legged Gulls which we will write about in a later blogpost when we have got the ringing information.