Mediterranean Gull in Bergen

A really rain full weekend here in Western Norway ended with the forth ever Mediterranean Gull (Larus melanocephalus) of the county. Earlier this Sunday we was out on the urban feeding places for gulls to catch first year Lesser Black-backed Gulls and Herring Gulls. It ended with one of each species and we were quite pleased with that when the the conditions were taken into account. After a late afternoon reading gulls in the different urban lakes a last visit was made to the city centre park. The first thing that got our attention was a Mew Gull (Larus canus) ringed with a white ring that we saw was not ours. A picture was taken and we saw that the ring had the number EZ95 and we know that this is probably a bird ringed by Frank Majoor in The Nederlands. We have earlier had four of his Mew Gulls in Bergen and it was really nice to get a new one.

After a gull with to much contrast between scapulars, upper wing coverts and greater coverts was spotted. A first-year Mediterranean Gull. YES! We had been waiting for this species to show up in the city centre park, and there it was. A few snapshots were taken before it took to the wings a flew across the lake heading south. This is only the fourth record in Hordaland county. So far in 2012 there have been around ten different individuals in Norway as a total, but many of these have not been considered by the local rarities committees so this number is not exact yet. In Hordaland these are the previous records, notice that the two first individuals was colour ringed.
  

•  22.07-06.10.1996, 1 3cy Bergen. Color-ringed (red  H135) in Szeged, Hungary. Was in 09.05.2004 seen in Nyski, Poland.

• 21.11.1997-23.03.1998, 1 1cy/2cy wintering in Bergen, This one also color-ringed (red  H775) in Szeged, Hungary. This bird was later seen in Suffolk Great Britain, Szege Hungary,  Antwerpen Belgium, Nyski Poland.
• 17.07-31.07 2012, 1 3cy in Norheimsund. 

Mediterranean Gull (Larus melanocephalus) in Bergen 30th of September.

Mew Gull EZ95 probably ringed by Frank Majoor in The Netherlands

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.

Ringing Mew Gulls pays off

During the autumn one of our goals was ringing at least hundred first winter Mew Gulls (Larus canus). We achieved this and managed to put plastic rings on 173 first winter individuals. The first reading came in Stavanger 150 kilometers south. During autumn and winter six of our birds was seen there. Of these six three have remained in Stavanger and wintered there.

The first international reading came from The Netherlands. In mid November one of our birds was observed in Groningen (read more here). Less than a week after the second was observed further south in The Netherlands in Overijssel. In January we had one in Denmark, but we could not understand why we didn't get any readings from England. Was it the mild winter that made the gulls stay on grassland and fields and therefore make them difficult to read? However, today (20th of March) we got a double reading from River Severn at Newnham near Gloucester thanks to John Sanders. One was ringed here in Bergen 26th of September and never seen here after. The other one was ringed in 16th of August and observed until 4th of September.

This map summarizes reading of the first-winter Mew Gulls ringed in Bergen during autumn 2011:

All readings of first-winter Mew Gulls ringed in Bergen during autumn 2011 (blue). The bold line from Bergen to Stavanger represent 6 individuals. The red line is reading of a breeding adult ringed in a colony north of Bergen.

J4K3 is one of the birds seen in England. Here pictured in the city centre lake in Bergen 4th of September.

In addition we have an observation of one of the breeding Mew Gulls in England. This individual is one of the first records that documents that breeding Mew Gulls in Hordaland county winter in England. This bird was ringed close to a breeding colony north of Bergen in Knarvik. The bird was seen in Rutland Water west for Leicester by Steve Lister the 28th of February 2012.

J7R3 pictured at the breeding site at Knarvik 22nd of July 2011.

Thanks to the gull readers: Alf Tore Mjøs, Henk van Huffelen, Frank Majoor, Flemming Fragtrup, John Sander and Steve Lister.

Ringing summary for December 2011

In December we ringed a total of 33 gulls. Most Herrings but two new Black-headed Gulls was nice bringing the year total up to 11.

Species	1Y	Sub adult	Adult
Mew Gull	2	3	8
Herring gull	9	3	6
Black-headed Gull	0	0	2
SUM	11	6	16

Ringing summary for November 2011

In November we ringed a total of 62 gulls. Most Mew Gulls (33) but not far behind Herring Gulls (26). The highlight of the month was the 1Y Iceland Gull caught on the 27th. This Iceland Gull is the second to be equipped with a ring in Hordaland county. Another highlight was the Estonian Mew Gull controlled on the 22nd. This is the third Estonian Mew to be controlled in Norway.

Species	1Y	Sub adult	Adult
Mew Gull	25	3	5
Herring gull	20	3	3
Black-headed Gull	1	0	1
Iceland Gull	1	0	0
SUM	47	6	9

A map summarising all Estonian Mew Gulls found in Norway.
Black: Found dead in Kopervik south of Haugesund in February 1933
Red: Controlled in the city centre lake in Bergen January 1990
Blue: The one we controlled 22nd of November 2011.
All are ringed as pullus in Estonia and controlled in Norway their first winter.

Iceland Gull J8Y6 the 27th of October. Photo: Lars Ågren

Mew Gull from Estonia

Today we had a quick after work ringing session in the Bergen city center together with Finn Jørgensen. The second gull we caught had a metal ring. We did not see the ring before catching it since the ring was on tibia so it was pure luck that this individual was our next gull. The ring had the inscription Estonia Matsalu and number UA5970. The reaction was YES and a high five, because this is our first Estonian bird. We measured it and put on a plastic ring on the other tarsus. Information is sent to the Matsalu Bird Ringing Centre and we wait in excitement for ringing information and possible life history data.

The 2Y Mew from Estonia

One old Mew and our first 1Y to The Netherlands

During this weekends gull work we first noticed that the gulls have become difficult to catch in the city center lake. Partly due to very mild weather for middle of November but also much disturbance of people visiting a temporary marked close to the best place to catch. We therefore tried an alternative place close by. That strategy gave us a Mew Gull ringed with metal only. We later found that it was 19 years old and ringed in Stavanger January 1993 as a 2Y. Old birds like this one are very difficult to catch, they are extremely careful and not at all willing to take the same risks as the 1Ys. On the other hand getting color ring on an individual like this one with an exactly known age is of great value. When we know the breeding area as well the value is even greater. It's possible that this individual breeds at Prestvannet right outside Tromsø because 30th of May 1999 the metal ring was read here. Mews that breeds in the area around Prestvannet is previously known to winter in the area around Bergen. It was our guest from Mandal, Finn Jørgensen who nicely caught this one for us. This weekend Finn and us from urban ringing Bergen exchanged methods, good gull stories and looked at gulls together. A very nice and informative weekend.

The six oldest Mew Gulls in Norway with color ring observed in 2011

Code	Age	Year born	Location*	Date*
JYY5	24	1987	Stavanger	25.03.2011
J777	23	1988	Bergen	03.03.2011
J2T9	21	1990	Bergen	13.11.2011
JYJ3	20	1991	Bergen	06.04.2011
J0L0	19	1992	Bergen	20.11.2011
JJ42	18	1993	Stavanger	25.03.2011

*The last location and date observed

J0L0 the 19 year old we equipped with color ring today. The fifth oldest Mew with color ring in Norway. It's moulting, P9 is growing and P10 is still old.

We also had our first 1Y Mew Gull observed in The Netherlands thanks to Frank Majoor who read it in Overijssel 17th of November 2011. The effort in August and September payed off. J6K6 was ringed at Tveitevatnet 08th of September and stayed in the Bergen until 15th of October. Measurement of skull and bill shows that it's a male.

J6K6 in Bergen city centre 12th of September 2011.

J6K6 southward migration

Ringing summary for October 2011

In October we ringed a total of 70 gulls. Most Herring gulls which were our main target this month. Top of the month was of course the Glaucous Gull which was ringed 13th of October. It was only present in Bergen one day after ringing and we have unfortunately not had any readings of it yet.

Species	1Y	Sub adult	Adult
Mew Gull	28	1	1
Herring gull	22	9	6
Black-headed Gull	1	0	1
Glaucous Gull	1	0	0
SUM	52	10	8

Glaucous Gull JN666 in Bergen 14th of October

Ringing of Glaucous Gull and more visitors from north

After an unsuccessful attempt to catch the Glaucous Gull yesterday we had a new go during our lunch break today (13th of October). When we came to the city centre lake there was no white winged gull to see, we searched the roofs, feed out two or three fresh bread and waited but the bird seemed to have disappeared. We had seen worrying headlines in the newspaper in the morning that a festival had opened the night before and used huge amount of fireworks. This seemed a likely explanation of the disappearance and we concluded that we had been happy to just see this huge white winged gull. By way of consolation we catched two Herring Gulls and got a new reading of a Mew Gull ringed by Nils Helge Lorenzen in Tromsø. When we looked this Mew Gull up in the database we saw that it was ringed just eight days earlier, which means that it has travelled the 1200 kilometres in the shortest time we in Bergen have recorded.

This 1Y Mew Gull (J7C9) migrated the 1200 kilometres from Tromsø to Bergen in eight days

In the evening we decided to just grab a few Mew Gulls at Tveitevannet, a lake in an urban area south of Bergen. When we went down the path the first sight that met us was a huge white gull sitting between the Mew Gulls. The Glaucous Gull was still present in Bergen! Other people feeding the gulls had also noticed this large white gull because it had dominated the whole feeding place and had chased and stolen food from the smaller ones. We also saw it was possible to come quite close to it and when feeding out fresh white bread we were able to catch it. This is the first ringed Glaucous Gull in Hordaland county ever and we believe there have been just a few ringed in Norway south of Trondheim. When ringing and measuring this lovely bird we both agreed that it must be very big, but since none of us have any experience with this species it's difficult to say what kind of sex it might be. We took blood samples as we do for all our gulls so a DNA analysis will give us the correct answer later. It will be really exiting to see if it is observed elsewhere or if it will stay in Bergen the rest of the winter.

The Glaucous Gull minutes before it was captured and ringed

Wing of Glaucous Gull JN666.

Head of Glaucous Gull JN666.

After our white winged friend had got it's freedom again we decided to explore a new possible place for reading and catching gulls - the landfill used by the entire Bergen city in Rådalen. This site has not been used as a gull site before since most garbage are burnt here, but a guy working at the place gave us a tip that there are gulls and they flock around the organic dump. Today the organic dump was not to crowed with gulls. Only a handful of Great Black-backed Gulls and 30-40 Herring Gulls, but one of the Herrings was ringed and paid for the effort of driving here. It turned out that this one also was ringed outside Tromsø as a pullus this spring by Nils Helge Lorenzen.

1Y Herring Gull J2400 ringed right outside Tromsø as a pullus 1220 kilometres from Bergen

When we opened our mailboxes well at home we also saw a message saying that one of our Bergen ringed 1Y Mew Gulls had been seen right outside Stavanger. This is our third 1Y Mew Gull observed in the same area. A map can summarize the day.

Red line: Mew Gull J7C9 and Herring Gull J2400 both ringed in Tromsø. Blue line: Mew Gull J6K3 ringed in Bergen and read in Sandnes 170 kilometres to the south

1Y Mew Gull from Tromsø, Northern Norway

Today we had this autumns first reading of a foreign 1Y Mew Gull in the city centre of Bergen. This one was ringed by Nils Helge Lorenzen in Tromsø at Prestvannet. Nils Helge is one of the most experienced gull ringers in Norway and are together with Morten Helberg in charge of the Norwegian program for colour ringing of gulls. He informed us one week ago that we must keep our eyes open for one of his 130 ringed Mew gulls, it did not take long time before the first one appeared. J5V5 was ringed 1st of September and remained at the ringing location for three weeks. It was seen in Bergen 1207 kilometres to the south west in Norway 18 days after it was seen in Tromsø for the last time. It would be exiting to know if there are any other urban stopover sites between Bergen and Tromsø, so birders keep your eyes open for ringed Mew Gulls.

We know form earlier ringing efforts (using metal ring only) that Mew Gulls from the area around Tromsø winters in Bergen. So this was an expected observation. We will come back with a blogpost summarising where the winter population of Mews in Bergen have their origin.

J5V5 was ringed in Tromsø and was seen in the city centre of Bergen 10th of October

1Y Mew Gull J5V5

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

Great Black-backed Gull and lots of Mew Gulls

On the 22nd of September we caught our first 1Y Great Black-backed Gull (Larus marinus) in the city centre of Bergen. We had seen this individual between the Herring gulls for about a week and it was on the top of our wanted list. Finally, on this Thursday it came too close when Christian was giving bread to the Herring Gulls and it was nicely hand cached. This actually makes it the first ever hand cached Great Black-backed Gull in Bergen. We have to admit that it was rather small (body mass: 1450 g and head+bill: 132,1 mm) and probably a female, but still the first!

Wing of Great Black-backed Gull JN600.

Head of Great Black-backed Gull JN600.

The next day the total number of ringed 1Y Mew Gull reached one hundred. This fulfil one of our goals for the season and we immediately set another goal of two hundred 1Y Mew's. As writing we have already reached 120 much because we now are three active gull ringers in Bergen. Vegard Finset Fjeldheim has joined the team! One trained ringer more makes it possible to more quickly ring and measure the gulls when we have a window when they are catchable.

Our effort of catching 1Y Mew Gulls have also given us another reading. As our first reading (J6R1) this new was also seen by Alf Tore Mjøs. This time in Breiavatnet (a lake in the city centre of Stavanger) 49 days after ringing and 156 kilometres south.

J3R6 moving 156 kilometres from Bergen to Stavanger

J3R6 at Breiavatnet, Stavanger. Photo: Alf Tore Mjøs

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 young and the old...

After returning from warm and sunny Andalucía our work continued in rainy Bergen. And what a week to be back with rain in loads every day. A quick check of the gulls in heavy rain 8th of September gave us our oldest Mew gull (Larus canus) so far.

Unfortunately we were only able to take pictures of the ring. After checking the pictures we sent the number of the ring by sms to Alf Tore Mjøs, who also is part of the urban ringing project in Norway. He quickly replied that this gull was ringed by him self (!) on 28th of October in 1992 as a 3Y+ at exactly the same location. This makes this individual at least 21 years of age. The same bird was also seen and read at Blåvands huk in Denmark 6th of February this year. The observation in Denmark makes this bird much more interesting and we will really try to catch it and put a plastic ring on it. Is it using Bergen as a stop-over site for moulting and will continue it's migration southwards?

In addition to set an age record we also had our first observation of a true urban nestling Mew Gull ringed in Bergen. J6R1 which hatched on Marineholmen (University of Bergen campus) the 8th of June this year was observed in Sandnes 170 km south of Bergen. Nice observation be we want more...

Blue line: Showing the movement of the 21 year old Mew Gull (MA27418) from Blåvandshuk 06.02.2011 to Bergen 08.09.2011. Red line: Showing the urban nestling J6R1 movement from where it hatched in Bergen to Sandnes South-Western Norway where it was observed by Alf Tore Mjøs 04.09.2011.

MA27418 our 21 year old Mew Gull in heavy rain in Bergen

J6R1 at it's hatching site at University of Bergen campus 25th of July 2011

This years first 1Y weekend

1Y Mew Gull. Do not scream with food in your mouth

When the weather forecast for the weekend said cloudy and rain showers we decided to go for a weekend catching 1Y gulls. Despite several interesting football matches in Premier League we choose gull catching (!) just following the matches on our mobile phones. Primarily we tried to achieve our goal of catching one hundred 1Y Mew Gulls before end of September, but if a Herring or Lesser Black-backed gull comes to close we will of course also grab these. Friday evening started will with six Mew Gulls and one Herring gull in just over one hour. Saturday was even better, but we only had a window of approximately two hours to easily get gulls. After the sun burst though the clouds and loads of people, dogs and children occupied the best places to catch. The gulls became more and more 'thick-necked' and less and less eager to come close to us. The day ended with seven Mew Gulls and two Herring Gulls. On Sunday we woke up to fully clouded sky and rain. This weather really make the gulls easy to catch and in the end of the day we had ringed 16 Mew Gulls and 2 Herring gulls.

We also did one interesting reading when we saw a 1Y Mew Gull we marked in an suburb area north of Bergen in the city centre of Byparken. The distance is only about 10 kilometres, but it is interesting to know that gull hatched in the suburbs make their way to the city centre to feed before migration starts. The marked increase of 1Y gulls in the city centre the last week may therefore be birds form the areas surrounding Bergen (both suburban breeders and 1Y's form breeders in natural habitat) and the urban gulls form the city centre.

J2R8 moving from the suburbs to the city centre of Bergen

Our first 1Y weekend gave us these results:

Species	1Y	Sub adult
Mew Gull	26	3
Herring gull	4	1

JN703, a big 1Y male Herring gull was one of our results this weekend

Our total number of 1Y Mew gull is at the time of writing 39 individuals. This includes one ringed as pullus which later got plastic.

Ringing summary for July 2011

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

In July we concentrated the effort of catching as many adult gulls as we could. Most of them were Mew Gulls (Larus canus) since these are the easiest species to catch. However, we also used many hours of trying to get as many adult Lesser Blacked-backed Gulls (Larus fuscus intermedius) as well. These are of special interests because they have become urban breeders in the city centre of Bergen. We first observed this nesting strategy in 2007 when one pair nested on the Science building at University of Bergen. This year the number of roof-breeding Lesser black-backed gulls (LBG) is probably closer to 20 pairs. The problem with LBG's is the time needed to catch one individual which our July number of this species indicate. On the other hand none urban breeding adult LBG's has ever been ringed in Bergen and to get information on survival and future breeding behaviour can be very interesting! The first Black-headed Gull was ringed on the 26th of July two weeks after the first individual arrived. See the blog post The black-headed gulls are back.

Our numbers for July are as follows:

Species	1Y	Sub adult	Adult
Mew Gull	1	7	28
Lesser Blacked-backed Gull	1	0	7
Herring gull	0	2	1
Black-headed Gull	0	1	0

We will come back with a blog post on our readings and controls later.

The winter Mew Gulls are back in Bergen

J800 arrived at Tveitevatnet 08th of August.
Photo: Eirik Nydal Adolfsen

The first of our regular winter Mew gulls (Larus canus) was seen at Tveitevannet 08th of August. J800 was ringed 24th of February 2004 as a 2Y and is therefore in it's 9th year now. The bird has been seen every winter in the Bergen area except for the winter 2009/2010. It probably breeds north or east of Bergen. The arrival date this year concur with a period when the adult Mew Gulls are migrating.

The adult Mew Gulls breeding in Bergen also seems to have migrated. The adults we ringed in late May, June and to about 10th of July were not regularly seen after 25th of July. On the 10th of August we visited one of the breeding colonies north of Bergen (Kvassnesstemma in Knarvik) a locality where we have done some catching this year. Here we did not find a single adult bird, just 1Y's and a few 2Y's. They all seems to be gone south! We hope to get some sightings of these individuals this winter in Great Britain or The Netherlands.

Ready for the 1Y Mew Gulls

The last days more and more first year mew gulls have started to show up in the city centre of Bergen.  To not be short of rings we used the friday evening to make 100 new plastic rings. The process is quite easy and the pictures below show how to do it.

The plastic plates when they arrive from engraver.

To be able to roll the plastic we put them in hot boiling water

The rings are rolled by hand

After the ring is put into a metal pipe and then put back into boiling water to get the right shape. A stick which fit the inside of the ring it put though the metal pipe and the plastic ring.

 

When the ring has the correct shape put it in cold water

Then the rings are perfect for a mew gull legg.

The finished product...