Nov. 2, 2003 Lake Co. TN I got to Britton Ford too late Saturday to see Mike's phenomenal aggregation of Franklin's Gulls and missed my chance to add that species to my year list. After putting the Red Phalarope to bed at dusk along with 9 Dunlin, 21 Wilson's Snipe, and a group of 12 Least Sandpipers, I decided to traveled to Reelfoot. Coming down 78 highway in the early morning today, I saw string after string of gulls heading from the roost on the lake to the river. I arrived at the park west of Tiptonville on the Mississippi and saw three large groups of gulls in the morning light on the huge sandbar. Scanning the first or southern most group, I came across a single Franklin's Gull and was quite pleased to finally make that tick for the year. I moved north to look over a big flock of American White Pelicans and after counting 243, I started looking at the gulls. Wow, they were almost 100% Franklin's, I counted over 800 and they were still coming in. I called Nancy Moore and she left breakfast in the pan to see the spectacle. Just before she got there I looked at the other group of gulls and they were all Franklin's plus more were falling in. I started a recount and had 1130+ in the first group and 610+ in the second. I told Nancy to recount the south group and she came up with about 1100 also. We then noticed that there were even more birds just over the rise in the sandbar but these were too hidden to count. The birds stretched about 1/4 of a mile down the bar. She had to get back to her guest's breakfast and I pulled out a stool and sat down to go back through the groups. As another group came in I was able to pick out 2 very large dark gulls that turned into winter plumaged Laughing Gulls. A few birds would come in and then a few started leaving and came across the river directly toward me, I followed them and turned to discover even more birds were passing behind me. I scanned and found a huge funnel cloud of Franklin's to the east. I got into the truck and went east and counted 320 birds in the funnel and in a steady wide spread movement due south. I traveled south to Ridgley without ever being out of sight of Franklin's Gulls. I found two more funnels and concentrations of 327 and 462. As the birds left the top of these clouds they dispersed and wandered south. From 7:30 to 10:45 I had a total of 2849 plus many that passed uncounted. I returned to Tiptonville when the birds became too widespread to follow. There were fewer birds there and shortly the whole lot got up in a cloud and headed south. I got a photo of part of that group and some flight shots as they passed overhead. There were only 3 Franklin's left on the bar. I went south to Island 13 Road and sat at the boat ramp and again was joined by Nancy. The birds were still passing over and by 12:44 the birds had thin out and I had added 296 making a total of over 3,145 Franklin's Gulls counted. To say the least it was an impressive movement to have witnessed. I had a few Franklin's through the afternoon at every river stop as far south as Heloise. Added bonuses were 4 Black-bellied Plovers, a group of 14 Greater White-fronted Geese and an immature Lesser Black-backed Gull in with numerous Ring-billed, Herring and Bonaparte's Gulls on the Tiptonville Bar. Good Birding!!! Jeff R. Wilson OL'COOT / TLBA Bartlett, TN =================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER===================== The TN-Bird Net requires you to sign your messages with first and last name, city (town) and state abbreviation. ----------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------- To post to this mailing list, simply send email to: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx ----------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send email to: tn-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * TN-Bird Net is owned by the Tennessee Ornithological Society Neither the society(TOS) nor its moderator(s) endorse the views or opinions expressed by the members of this discussion group. Moderator: Wallace Coffey, Bristol, TN wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society web site at http://www.tnbirds.org * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Topographical Maps located at http://topozone.com/find.asp * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================