Diario de jgordon

On the morning of Saturday, March 6th at around 9am, I went to the Lake Champlain lakefront to observe waterfowl. I started at the dock by the Rubenstein lab, and saw a flock of about 10-15 Ring-billed Gulls roughly 30 meters from the shore. Most were floating on the water, although occasionally one Gull would fly downwards towards the flock while calling loudly. Perhaps a food source was found nearby? A few meters away from the Ring-billed Gulls, 8 Mallards- 6 males and 2 females were lined up very close to each other (under a foot away?) on the lake. Further out, about a few hundred meters away from the lakeshore, 4-5 Common Mergansers were swimming in a straight line.The male was in the front of the line. At the dock, just a few meters from me, two Rock Pigeons began aggressively fighting each other. At first it appeared that they were preening each other, however they started grunting at each other, flapping there wings directly on top of each other, and digging their bills into the other pigeon's head and neck. They may have been trying to claim a territory. A third Rock Pigeon calmly stood right next to the fighting pigeon, seemingly unalarmed.

I then moved .1 miles south to a dock off of a public park. Most of the water near the dock was covered by a thin sheet of ice. Roughly 40 Ring-billed Gulls were flocked on the ice, some resting on the dock. Again, I noticed that one Gull would fly downwards towards the flock while calling loudly. Only a few other Gulls seemed to notice this behavior. Around 20 Mallards were also present on the ice and on the dock. A few of them would repeatedly dip their bills in and out of the water, and some were foraging for food with their rear faced upwards, and head and neck directly in the water. Many Mallards were resting on the ice or dock, with their bills buried into their feathers. Some of the resting mallards were standing on one leg, while others had both legs bend and hidden under their bodies. The Mallards were clearly separated from the Ring-billed Gulls, although I did notice a few Ring-billed Gulls intermingling in Mallard territory to sit on the dock or walk past them on the ice.