If you are a fan of entertaining tales that blend bird biology, history, and human eccentricity, Tim Birkhead’s new work The Great Auk (Bloomsbury, 2025) will find a welcome place on your night stand. I have to confess that this is the first Birkhead book I have read, but the title suggested a fascinating story about a topic I knew very little about, so right away I requested a review copy from the publisher. My efforts did not disappoint.
The Great Auk by Tim Birkhead (Bloomsbury, 2025)
For me, the first question that needed answering was, “What the heck was a Great Auk?” I had, of course, heard of Great Auks during my twelve years observing, researching, and writing about birds but I hazily lumped them in with the totally unrelated Dodo and elephant birds. Why? Probably because all of these birds had been large and flightless—and all had gone extinct. Other than that, I knew almost nothing about Great Auks.
Great Auks were the original penguins, conferred the genus name Pinguinus. The origin of the name penguin is uncertain but may refer to the bird’s white head or white eye patch. In any case, the name was later applied to flightless birds of the Southern Hemisphere, even though they bear no close relationship to the Great Auk. (Photo copyright Errol Fuller)
Upon opening Birkhead’s book it was therefore a great relief to learn, “Oh, yeah. Great Auks are actually auks—seabirds!” I mean, duh, right? Members of the Alcid family, their closest living relatives appear to be Razorbills, something I found delightful since Braden showed me my first Razorbills only last Thanksgiving when our family had the chance to visit Cape Cod (see post Birding Race Point). Birkhead is quick to point out, however, that surprisingly little is known about Great Auk biology, much of it speculation from the relatively scant specimen material that has survived.
Seeing one of the Great Auk’s closest relatives, Razorbills, provided a living link to the tragedy of the Great Auk’s extinction.
Which, of course, brings us to the tragic fact that Great Auks were quickly and efficiently wiped out almost as soon as seafaring Europeans on their way to North America figured out where the birds nested. That happened to be remote islands in the North Atlantic, and in historical times, there probably never were more than a handful of breeding sites for the birds. In early chapters, Birkhead especially focuses on what was clearly the most important site, Funk Island. Here, tens—perhaps hundreds—of thousands of Great Auks gathered every year. Couples would each lay their single, exceedingly large egg and work together to feed the resultant, rapidly-growing chicks from the abundant fish schools nearby.
Like Razorbills, puffins, murres, and murrelets, guillemots such as this Black Guillemot are members of the Alcid family, and close relatives of the Great Auk.
When Europeans did discover the auk bounty to be had, the slaughter began. Ships heading to what is now northeast Canada stopped over to feast on the auks and preserve them for food. Later, egg, skin, and feather collectors helped finish them off. Birkhead especially documents the brutal habits of egg collectors. Not wanting to obtain eggs with well-developed embryos inside, the collectors would intentionally crush every egg that they found. Returning a few days later, they could be assured that the embryo inside of any new egg had not yet developed, and its contents could be easily removed through a tiny hole made in the shell. Officially, the last two auks were killed in 1844, though it is likely that a few isolated individuals survived into the following couple of decades.
Birkhead neatly divides The Great Auk into two parts. The first focuses mainly on the history of the bird, its demise, and what can be constructed of its biology from historical accounts, surviving specimens, and extant relatives. Part 2 focuses mainly on some of the more rabid egg and skin collectors, especially Vivian Hewitt, who somehow managed to acquire thirteen Great Auk eggs for his vast collection of approximately half a million bird eggs.
A selection of known surviving Great Auk eggs shows their great variety, which may have helped parents identify them in the crowded breeding colony. This variety also partly explains why they were so attractive to collectors. (Illustration by Henrik Grønvold, 1907)
I have to say that I enjoyed Part 2 just as much as Part 1. Few of us realize this today, but oologist—a term coined for egg collectors that attempted to confer scientific legitimacy upon a practice that we now consider despicable—was all the rage in the early 1900s. It was practiced much as stamp and coin collecting were when I was a kid—and with little thought about the consequences for birds. Collectors routinely not only gathered an egg of a species, but entire clutches of eggs and even hundreds from the same species, searching for variety, fame, and fortune.
As perhaps the wealthiest participant in the field, Hewitt spent a small fortune both obtaining individual eggs and opportunistically snapping up entire collections of other egg collectors when their fortunes turned for the worst. Most prized of Hewitts acquisitions were the eggs and mounted specimens of the Great Auk that he managed to obtain, each of which has a story—and many of which Birkhead traces to fascinating effect. I won’t say more about this fine book, but if you enjoyed Christopher Skaife’s The Ravenmaster and Joshua Hammer’s The Falcon Thief, you are almost guaranteed to love The Great Auk, too. And if you do, why not help prevent the extinction of other bird species by donating to the American Bird Conservancy, the National Audubon Society, or another group working to protect our precious surviving species? Thousands of bird species are in trouble and the need is great.
Instead of your regularly-scheduled blog, we today invite FSB readers to join in on an urgent appeal to help protect one of North America’s coolest and most vital bird habitats—the globally important Bolivar Peninsula. Learn more and donate by clicking here—or on the Piping Plover below.
If you’ve followed FatherSonBirding—or read my books Birding for Boomers or Warblers & Woodpeckers: A Father-Son Big Year of Birding—you know that High Island and the Bolivar Peninsula outside of Houston have played pivotal roles in Braden’s and my birding experiences. In these locations, the Houston Audubon Society (HAS) has worked tirelessly to obtain, restore, and protect vital habitat for both migrating and resident birds. On our first visit to High Island and the Bolivar Peninsula in 2016, Braden and I saw an astounding forty-five Life Birds in one day! These included everything from Scarlet Tanagers and Least Terns to Piping, Black-bellied, and Semipalmated Plovers.
Braden and I saw our first-ever Piping Plovers on the Bolivar Peninsula, and I was lucky to see this endangered species again on a subsequent visit.
Even though I live in Montana, I became an annual supporter of HAS shortly after that visit. Even better, I have been fortunate to visit the area three more times. Every trip has been a highlight of my birding career. Each time, I have seen gobs of amazing songbirds, shorebirds, and waders, and learned a ton about birds. Just check out some of my past posts about visiting the region:
Unfortunately, during my visits, I also have noticed an inescapable fact: the Bolivar Peninsula is being developed at an astounding rate and the reason is clear: beachfront property. During our first visit there, Braden and I noticed quite a few houses along the 25-mile or so stretch of the peninsula. On each subsequent visit, I was blown away by how many new houses had sprung up since my previous visit! On my most recent trip, this past April, I realized with dismay that the entire peninsula would soon be wall-to-wall housing developments.
One of dozens of major housing developments that have sprung up on the Bolivar Peninsula since Braden and I first visited in 2016.
I can’t even begin to explain how poorly-conceived this kind of rampant development is. Never mind that it has gobbled up some of the best remaining Gulf Coast wildlife habitat, it is virtually guaranteed that hurricanes will totally destroy these developments as they have in the past—and with increasing frequency thanks to climate change (see this Hurricane Ike story and this astonishing storm list). In fact, the ability of the peninsula in its natural state to block tidal surges, prevent erosion, and soak up storm water economically outweighs by far the short-term profits from this get-rich-quick development.
Rampant development in coastal areas not only destroys critical habitat, it greatly diminishes the ability of the coast to withstand hurricanes and other major storms. Though I’d love to enjoy a beachfront house like this myself, economically it is a lose-lose situation, both for homeowners and taxpayers, who often get stuck with paying the bills for disaster cleanup and rebuilding.
Still, the lure of fast profits is just too much here as it is in many other places. And that’s why I’m writing this post. Right now is one of our last best chances to protect what remains of this globally vital birding habitat. How? Currently, HAS owns and manages more than 3,000 acres of Bolivar Peninsula habitat—natural islands in an expanding sea of development. And yet, right at the entrance to their Bolivar Flats Shorebird Sanctuary, a new development recently cropped up. Ironically dubbed the Sanderling Development, it threatened to wipe out critical habitat and destroy a buffer to the core of the Bolivar refuge. The good news? Through heroic efforts, HAS managed to raise $3 million to buy 25 acres of the land this past July. Now, however, they need another $3 million to complete purchase of the remaining 27 acres of the property. This land is so vital that for the first time in decades, HAS has issued a public appeal for funds—And that’s where we come in!
Just one of many Bolivar housing developments, the proposed Sanderling Development directly threatened the ecological integrity of the Bolivar Flats refuge right across the road. However, HAS still needs to raise $3 million to complete the property’s acquisition. Click on this photo to donate!
No matter where we live, securing this last bit of property should be a major priority for birders. Not only does it help provide essential stop-over areas for millions of migrating birds that spread out across the continent, it helps protect critical breeding and wintering habitat. Endangered Piping Plovers, Black Rails, and Red Knots are just three endangered species among hundreds of other species that use this important area.
A fall Long-billed Curlew at Bolivar Flats—perhaps just returned from breeding in Montana?
So how about it? Do you have $25 to chip in? $100? $1000? If you do, I can say with confidence that your money will rarely be better spent. Along with donating, why not plan a spring or fall trip down to the area? If you are fortunate enough to be able to do this, I can almost guarantee it will be one of the highlights of your birding experiences. You also will not have the slightest doubt that your investment in this area is one of the best you will ever make. To donate, CLICK HERE NOW!
And with that, I will sign off so I can make a contribution myself!
Houston Audubon’s Bolivar Peninsula’s sanctuaries are not only vital for Texas birds, but for breeding birds throughout North America.
The state of Maine can be simplified to four things: lobster, moose, blueberries, and puffins (with Dunkin Donuts as a runner-up). During the four years I’d spent going to school in the state, I’d eaten lobster rolls, visited blueberry bogs, and tried my hardest to find a moose, a quest that would continue later this week. Through no fault of my own, I had never even tried to see a puffin and the reason was simple—my school year did not overlap with the Atlantic Puffin school year. This year, however, was different. I was actually still in the state of Maine as puffins were arriving at their breeding colonies, and was not going to miss my last chance to see these iconic seabirds. So, on May 14th, I boarded a large boat in Bar Harbor and took my seat in the cabin, binoculars and camera ready.
Unlike previous boat rides I’d taken to see birds, this cruise was relaxed and family-friendly. About two hundred people crowded the deck, many of whom were just as interested in the Bald Eagles and American Herring Gulls circling above the harbor as the prospect of seeing any alcids (Alcidae is the family of birds that includes puffins, murres, auks, and guillemots). Over the intercom, a very knowledgeable guide spouted off a non-stop stream of facts about the islands, lighthouses, and wildlife of the area as we headed for Egg Rock, a sparse strip of land just barely visible to tourists standing onshore in Bar Harbor. With the coastline of Acadia National Park to our right, we slowed as we approached the island.
This Common Murre was the only one I saw the whole boat ride. While this species hasn’t yet started nesting at Petit Manan, the ornithologists are hopeful that they will soon!
Egg Rock did not have a puffin colony—it was too close to shore for that. What it did have were colonies of several other species of seabirds. Gulls dominated the island, mostly Herring with scattered numbers of Great Black-backed Gulls mixed in, their charcoal backs sticking out amongst the sea of gray. Cormorants patrolled the southern side of the island, standing tall like gargoyles on the rocks. And in the waters lapping up against the side of the island I saw my first alcids—Black Guillemots! Although guillemots, which are black with white wing patches in the summer and white with black wing patches in the winter, are in the same bird family as Atlantic Puffins, they are far easier to see in Maine. Not only do they breed right on the coast during the warm months, they also stay for the winter—something that the puffins do not do. That’s one of the reasons why I’d never seen puffins here during my time at the University of Maine: From August to April, these birds stay as far from shore as possible, floating around somewhere in the North Atlantic.
After circling Egg Rock to look at the seabird colonies, as well as the dozens of Harbor and Gray Seals lounging on the rocks, the boat picked up speed and headed out to sea. While we never lost sight of the coastline, it grew hazier and hazier until eventually, a new island appeared on the horizon: Petit Manan. The first thing I noticed about Petit Manan were the buildings. Many islands off the coast of Maine had lighthouses, built during centuries past to help steer ships into harbors. As recently as the late 1900s, lighthouse keepers and their families lived on the islands and maintained the lighthouses, although by now many of the keepers had left, likely because boats had better forms of navigation at their disposal. The houses they left behind had been taken over by people working a very different type of job.
The Lighthouse on Petit Manan Island.
Both Egg Rock and Petit Manan are part of a large reserve known as Maine Coastal Islands National Wildlife Refuge. Every summer, dozens of wildlife technicians head out to these islands to spend weeks and months working with the birds that live there. On some islands, like Petit Manan, this work includes Atlantic Puffins, but it also includes monitoring and conservation of other species like Common, Arctic, and Roseate Terns, Common Murres, Black Guillemots, Razorbills, Common Eiders, and Leach’s Storm-petrels. Several of my peers at the University of Maine worked for Maine Coastal Islands and would be heading out to their assigned locations within the next few weeks.
I began to make out large rafts of birds next to the island as our boat approached, and was delighted to spot football-sized alcids with rainbow bills taking off in front of us. I raised my binoculars and smiled—these were the first Atlantic Puffins I’d seen in seven years, since 2018 when I’d been lucky enough to visit Iceland with my grandparents (see my post “All About Alcids”). The birds lounged in the water close to the rocks, and our guide told us that many of them had likely just returned for the summer from their mysterious marine wintering grounds. I counted ninety or so during our half hour stay at Petit Manan.
A raft of Atlantic Puffins and Razorbills!
The puffins weren’t alone. Black Guillemots were here, too, as were a couple dozen Razorbills, another gorgeous black-and-white alcid named after the unique shape and decoration of its beak. I spotted a single Common Murre amongst their ranks, my fourth alcid of the day and a species that had not yet attempted to nest at Petit Manan—but scientists were optimistic! A dozen or so Common Terns circled the island loftily, letting out loud “kyeeeer” calls to notify everyone who was really in charge here. In a few weeks, the numbers of terns would swell into the hundreds, and include Arctic as well as Common. Terns were the aggressive defenders of islands, and would dive-bomb anything they perceived as a threat, including people. I remembered one walk in Iceland when we were asked to hold a tall, wooden stick so the Arctic Terns there would target that instead of our heads!
These birds are the reason that so many alcids nest at Petit Manan. The huge tern colony on this and other islands provide safety for the puffins from predators like gulls and Peregrine Falcons that might otherwise raid their nests. Of course, the biologists working for Maine Coastal Islands NWR were also there to aid these species and chase predators off the island. It hadn’t always been that way, unfortunately.
Common Terns nest in huge, aggressive colonies along the Maine coast!
A hundred years ago, feathered hats were all the rage in cities across the east coast of North America. The demand for white feathers meant that large numbers of terns, gulls, and egrets were harvested—to the extent that these species declined dramatically across much of the country. With no terns to protect them, puffins nesting in Maine were faced with higher predation, but not just from other birds. Rampant collection of eggs and puffin meat also plagued many of Maine’s islands, leading to a dramatic decrease in this species down to just two tiny colonies. Sadly, it was looking like the Atlantic Puffin would join the ranks of the Great Auk and Labrador Duck in Maine’s list of extinct birds.
Thankfully, ornithologists and bird-lovers alike noticed how much environmental damage was being caused by these practices and stepped in. Groups like Audubon formed and began lobbying for the protection of birds, eventually leading to the passing of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. And in 1973, Audubon launched Project Puffin. Scientists were sent out to islands equipped with broadcasting equipment and decoys, as well as a small number of puffin chicks donated from colonies in Canada. Step one was the rearing of chicks on islands that had previously been occupied by puffin colonies; step two meant attracting terns back to the islands. Finally, with their defenders back in place, Atlantic Puffins began returning to many of the islands they’d previously been extirpated from. They now occupy six colonies in Maine.
Today, Atlantic Puffins are doing well, but are still being monitored very carefully. Puffins feed on fish that thrive in deep, cold water. That’s why the species only nests on the outermost islands in Maine. Our guide told us, “Puffins would lay their eggs in the ocean if they could.” Unfortunately, the Gulf of Maine is warming faster than any other body of water in the world, and this means that puffins are having to travel farther and farther out to sea to obtain their prey items of choice. During particularly warm years, puffins have switched their selected prey entirely to other species. Many of these other species of fish, which are brought back to their chicks on Petit Manan and other islands, differ in their size and the toughness of their skin. Often puffin chicks cannot eat them, and will starve even when food is sitting right there.
The man-made burrows where puffins nest on Petit Manan!
The good news is that there are many, many people keeping an eye on these birds, doing their best to keep their numbers high. Last year was an especially good year for the species, so optimism is in the air. I felt cautiously hopeful for the future of this species as the Bar Harbor Puffin Tour headed back to shore, content with the pictures and new memories I’d experienced with this iconic Maine species.
This week we are delighted to present our first guest post from Scott Callow. Scott and I (Sneed) met in the fourth grade, endured Boy Scouts together, and have spent hundreds of hours in the outdoors together. Scott majored in environmental studies and is one of the first people ever to take me birding, at Coal Oil Point in Santa Barbara. We have refreshed our friendship many times, including with several memorable recent birding adventures (see our posts “Chasing Migrants, Part I: Swifts, Peeps, and Plovers” and “Abbotts Lagoon, Point Reyes National Seashore”). We are also fortunate to have photos by Scott and his buddy Steve Rosso (the bird photos) to share. If you are enjoying FatherSonBirding, why not subscribe by filling out the “Subscribe Now” box down in the right-hand column?
(All photos copyright Steve Rosso or Scott Callow.)
My former work colleague, Steve, and I spent 2 hours deciding which walks and talks we would do at our first winter Morro Bay Bird Festival. It was just over a week since the registration opened. Everything we chose turned out to be full, even with over 263 events, 191 of them field trips. Lesson learned. (We later learned that the Pelagic Boat Trip filled within an hour.) We were able to sign up for two outings, a Big Day at the inland Santa Margarita Lake and a “Back of the Bay” walk in Los Osos. Steve also made the wise demand to stop at the Pinnacles National Monument on our way down, and convinced me to spend the extra money ($55) on a boating tour of Morro Bay itself. (Readers are encouraged to open up a map of the region.)
Our first stop was along the lonely Highway 25 between Hollister and Pinnacles’ east entrance. We badly wanted one soaring raptor to be a California Condor but it turned out to be a Golden Eagle. Later (2-3pm), at the observation overlook a mile up the Condor Gulch Trail, more than 15 dark soaring birds suddenly appeared as a group from behind the eroded sandstone Hain’s Peak. I confidently identified four as Condors, one as a Golden Eagle (clearly seeing the difference between each’s white markings on the undersides), and many Turkey Vultures. Steve’s new camera clicked away. At the trailhead, a ranger told us that, years ago, the population was below 10 individuals when reintroduction began and now the local population had swelled to “three digits.”
Pinnacles National Park. And yes, at least some of those black specks are California Condors!
The next morning we embarked on our first festival field trip: a Big Day at Santa Margarita Lake. It was led by Mark Holmgren, retired curator of the natural history museum and collection at UC Santa Barbara (my alma mater and where Sneed got his master’s degree). Highlights included comparing Eared, Horned, Western, Clark’s and Pied-billed Grebes, listening to Fox’s Sparrows, California Thrashers, and Wrentits, and observing raptor behavior. Speaking of, we saw Ospreys and Bald Eagles fishing (one birder theorized the adult eagles were teaching the juvenile), two Peregrine falcons mobbing a raven, and two Peregrines (perhaps the same) apparently fighting over food in mid-air or in courtship display. I got good looks at the yellow lores of a White-throated Sparrow.
Winter is a nice time to compare Clark’s (shown here) and Western Grebes, which can sometimes be difficult to tell apart. Clark’s Grebes have more orangish bills versus greenish-yellowish on Westerns. The black also rises above the eye on Clark’s, though that’s not as clear-cut on this individual.
Tired from our long day, we drove to the Morro Bay Community Center downtown and attended one of the two receptions. Included in the cost of registration were free local wines (multiple pours allowed), and extensive noshing trays of cheese, meats, veggies, crackers, and artisan chocolates. The adjacent bazaar impressed with booths for 3-4 high-end binocular/gear manufacturers, book shops, authors, nature art and nature organizations. The bazaar was well attended and the noise generated rivaled that of a Spring morning chorus.
The bird fest’s exhibit area had a nice variety of vendors and non-profits to occupy us between birding trips, talks, and meals.
Our dinner at Morro Bay’s affordable, healthy and creative Asian fusion cafe, Chowa Bowl is recommended, as is the lunch combo Big Deal of sushi roll and ramen noodles at Baywood-Los Osos’ funky hangout, Kuma. This is important info to a birder even though food and beverages are barely mentioned in The Avian Survival Kit chapter of Birding for Boomers. Good food and libations can elevate a birding trip. (Editor’s Note: We at FSB take exception to this criticism, as we have frequently mentioned fine dining establishments such as McDonald’s, Wendy’s, and Starbucks.)
Next day’s Back of the Bay trip was not only highlighted by lunch, but by Audubon’s Sweet Springs Nature Preserve. It’s a small preserve with a spring-fed creek and excellent views from its wooden observation decks of the bay’s mudflats and its shorebirds, ducks, gulls, and terns—tons of them (which is saying a lot since birds are so light.) With Morro Rock and Morro Dunes in the background, we saw Lesser and Western Sandpipers, too many Brants to count, 30+ Green-winged Teals, 4 Blue-winged Teals, American Wigeon, Northern Shoveler, Bufflehead, Long-billed Curlew, Killdeer, Black-bellied Plover, Great Egret, and Greater Yellowlegs. We learned the Greater has three notes in its call compared to the two notes of the Lesser. Ring-billed Gulls, Belted Kingfishers, and Forster’s Terns were seen flying above the bay.
These are the ducks that inspired The Guess Who’s 1970 Number One single “American Wigeon”. Fun Fact: Sneed saw The Guess Who’s lead singer, Burton Cummings, perform this song live in Rapid City, South Dakota in 1977.Sneed was favorably impressed by this performance—until ZZ Top took the stage and basically burned the place down.
In the narrow woodland area between street and bay we saw both Hairy and Nuttall’s Woodpeckers, and Chestnut-backed Chickadee. Then, local guide Dean led our car caravan down the road apiece to his friend’s house which sported about six bird feeders that earned a hot spot ranking on eBird. More chickadees, the ubiquitous House Finch, the most common local warblers—Yellow-rumped, Orange-crowned, Townsend’s—and Lincoln’s, Golden-crowned and White-crowned Sparrows. We also saw our Oak Titmouse, formerly lumped with Plain Titmouse, at the bird feeders. Its range is mostly endemic to California (stretching into parts of Oregon and Mexico) and the bird shares its place with the Acorn Woodpecker as a signature species in California’s oak woodlands.
Dean also shared his mnemonic for our (Pacific Group) White-crowned Sparrow – “Awf man!, I dough-ont wanna see”. It’s a bit of a stretch but “I don’t want to see” sums up many people’s self-engineered denials of science nowadays, so I decided to add it to my mnemonic checklist.
The rarity highlight of the trip was the sole Blue-winged/Cinnamon Teal hybrid. I “put good eyes on it” but Steve left his camera in the car because he logically thought he’d get better shorebird and bay bird shots on the following day’s boating trip.
Female, juvenile, and nonbreeding Red-breasted Mergansers (above) can be difficult to distinguish from Common Mergansers, especially in winter, when they can be swimming side by side. We think this is a Red-breasted because of its a) slightly thinner, upturned bill b) indistinct transition between the brown and gray on its neck and c) its crazier “hair-do”.
Our inside-the-bay boat trip the next day also included a fellow (and local) birder, Mike, who led bird trips. Steve and I learned a lot from him. The trip was created as a photography outing and the leader focused on pointing out good shots. The captain, also a birder, put the boat in good lighting and locations for the photographers. We were inspired to overtip him. The trip started in a downtown marina and we made a loop up to Morro Rock, along the rock jetties past the bay’s opening to the ocean, and then back into the bay to the mudflats of the Morro Bay Estuary. As we returned back to the docks, we passed the Morro Bay State Park Boardwalk, the Museum of Natural History, the Morro Bay Water Access, and Heron Rookery Natural Preserve—all excellent spots to bird from the shore, and perfect for photographers from the water due to the sun’s location.
We saw Peregrine Falcons above The Rock, Black Oystercatchers and Black Turnstones on the rocks, Black-crowned Night Herons in the trees, Ospreys on the masts, Common and Red-breasted Mergansers, several Eared Grebes and a Horned for comparison, and a nice collection of Brandt’s, Pelagic, and Double-crested Cormorants floating on a wooden raft. The Brandt’s Cormorants were especially striking with their iridescent coats and bright blue throat pouches. We were surprised to see some of the adults sporting very early breeding plumage marked by brilliant white “whisker” feathers around the ears and shoulders.
Cormorants put on a show under the gaze of their Western Gull overlord. Note the brilliant blue gular pouches on the Brandt’s Cormorants, along with their wispy white breeding feathers on the necks. A Double-crested with yellow markings skulks in the background.
Further inside the bay near the mudflats we saw large numbers, reaching into the hundreds, of Double-crested Cormorants, Marbled Godwits, and other shorebirds too far away to ID, plus good showings of White Pelicans, Ospreys, Ring-billed and Western Gulls, Northern Pintails, Buffleheads and Long-billed Curlews, Willets, and Greater Yellowlegs, as well as other common shorebirds not listed. Mike told us that the Pelagic Boat Trip ($160) was fantastic. If interested, check the bird list from the trip on the festival’s website.
Our “Inside of the Bay” boat trip featured a great variety of seabirds and shorebirds. Here, American White Pelicans earn extra style points.
The last night’s keynote speaker was Kenn Kaufman, author of Kingbird Highway, multiple nature guides, and his new The Birds that Audubon Missed: Discovery and Desire in the American Wilderness. He extolled birders to persist in their nature explorations, even beyond birds, and to pause the inclination to aggressively list in order to truly observe. He described the Morro Bay region as a “globally important ecological area” and the all-volunteer festival as top-notch and well organized, ranking it among the highest of the many he has attended.
232 species were identified collectively during the 5-day festival in mid-January. Events included typical bird walks, birding by boat, bicycle and kayak, birding for youth, beginners and advanced birders, birding with wine and olive oil tastings. Sites extended beyond the Morro Bay area including the Kern National Wildlife Refuge, the Carrizo Plains Ecological Reserve, various ranches, Atascadero, San Luis Obispo, and Pismo Beach. Check out the Long Report of the Festival Events Including Details on the website. More details than you will need to convince you to make next year’s festival are found at morrobaybirdfestival.org.
Scott (right) and Steve (left) while birding with Sneed in Marin County last fall. (I don’t know why Scott’s head looks a bit squished. I blame climate change, not my photographic skills.)
You may have noticed more references to gulls in our recent posts (see, for instance, “Birding Race Point” and “In Search of the Marbled Murrelet”). Or maybe not. Either way, Braden’s and my interest in gulls has been on the rise in recent years, and for good reason. Gulls are fascinating, beautiful, adaptable creatures worthy of attention. “So why didn’t you pay more attention to them before?” Roger, Scott, and some of our other loyal (and snarky) readers may ask. The reason is simple: gulls are hard. Many of the adults look similar, but if that isn’t perplexing enough, most gull species go through multiple molts which make them look radically different seasonally and from year to year—and frustratingly similar to other gulls in their various molts. The bottom line: to even approach competence identifying gulls, you have to devote a LOT of time to it, and finally, after about a decade of birding, Braden and I have felt ready to dip our toes into this task. Imagine our delight, then, to discover the release of a brand new book from Amar Ayyash, The Gull Guide: North America (Princeton University Press, 2024).
As soon as I heard about The Gull Guide, Amy and I bought a copy for Braden for Christmas. I quickly realized, however, that I wanted a copy of my own, so I contacted Princeton University Press and asked if they would like me to review the book. A week later, my own fresh copy arrived. Flipping through it, I recognized that I may have taken on more than I bargained for. The Gull Guide, I saw, is no mere specialized guide to a group of birds. It is a magnum opus—or in this case, a magnum gullpus—by one of the world’s foremost authorities on a subject. But let’s get to it . . .
First Impressions: attractive design; gorgeous photographic illustrations; logically and intuitively organized; comfortable to hold in your hands (really!).
My first casual flip through The Gull Guide conjured up a deep feeling that I was holding the Rosetta Stone to an important part of the birding universe. Upon the author’s suggestion, I started by reading the introduction and, I gotta say, this alone made the book worth buying. To wit, even though I knew that gulls seem to thrive in human-created places such as garbage dumps and parking lots, I had no idea just how successful and adaptable they are. To quote the author, “No gull species is known to have gone extinct for as long as modern taxonomy has kept records (Dee 2018). In many ways, they are similar to Homo sapiens: omnivores exploiting and consuming whatever they cross paths with.”
The first gull I looked up in The Gull Guide is one of Braden’s and my favorite species, Heermann’s Gulls. I learned that these handsome rascals are known for landing on the backs of Brown Pelicans—and stealing fish right out of their pouches!They nest primarily on a single island in the Gulf of California.
About fifty species of gulls inhabit the planet (fewer than I would have guessed), and The Gull Guide provides coverage of thirty-two that have a presence in North America. The author divides these into three categories:
Small Tern-like and Hooded Gulls
Gulls in the genus Larus
The Herring Gull complex (which is also made up of Larus species, but stands out for the difficulty in identifying and classifying them)
This last fall, I spent a lot of time looking at Glaucous-winged Gulls, part of the “Herring Gull complex”—a large group of beefy white-headed gulls. Adult Glaucous-wingeds can usually be ID’ed by the gray-and-white wing tips. However, this entire group of gulls is especially known to hybridize with each other, often making them notoriously difficult to identify.
If I had any hope that The Gull Guidewould help me learn to easily identify all of these different species, the author quickly laid that fantasy to rest. “It is important to accept that identifying every gull 100 percent of the time is an impractical undertaking,” he states early in the book. “The sooner we come to terms with this, the sooner we’re able to enjoy gulls for what they are. Struggling with an identification should be looked at as an opportunity to grow and cultivate our craft.”
Yeah, sure. Easy for him to say! For my part, I was eager to start building my skills. I therefore proceeded to read the excellent chapters on gull body parts, molts, and overall identification features. Then, I swooped into chapters on individual species.
Loyal FSB readers will recall that we got our lifer Ivory Gull on Flathead Lake on Braden’s birthday in 2020. Hundreds of birders from Montana and several other states made the pilgrimage to see this rare Montana vagrant.
As you would expect, for each species the author provides a basic overview followed by detailed information on the bird’s range, identification, molts, and hybrids—an especially important discussion since gulls are famous for hybridizing with each other in ways that are often difficult, if not impossible, to figure out. Part of what makes the book so impressive, though, is the inclusion of up to dozens of color plates for each species. These show each bird in different molts as well as geographic variation within the species, and abundant examples of hybridization as well.
Although The Gull Guide is very useful for beginning birders, it is clearly written and designed to accommodate expert birders, including those who wish to make the study of gulls one of their primary birding pursuits. As someone in between those two extremes, I have been using the book to tease out some of the gull challenges I have myself encountered—distinguishing between hybrid Glaucous-winged Gulls and Herring Gulls, for instance, or Franklin’s versus Laughing Gulls.
While it’s a treat to catch Bonaparte’s Gulls as they move through Montana, Braden and I had a great chance to observe them on the East Coast this past fall. The distinct black “dot” behind the eye is a good way to ID these widespread gulls in non-breeding plumage. In breeding, it has a totally black head. It is the only gull to nest largely in trees.
I especially pored through the gulls we have here in Montana, beginning with our most common species, the Ring-billed Gull. Here, I noticed something that could use correction, or at least more explanation. Ring-billed Gulls can be readily found in many parts of Montana throughout the year, and yet the range map for the species shows them as “year-round” only in certain Great Lakes locations. Braden confirms they are also on the eastern seaboard throughout the year, and eBird bar charts also show them as present throughout the year in many other states. I’m sure the author knows this, so in the next edition, to avoid confusion, I’d like to see his reasoning or methodology for how the range map is created.
That aside, I am sure that The Gull Guidewill become a dog-eared companion for both Braden and me as our expertise and interest in this fascinating group of birds continues to grow. This isn’t the first reference book a beginning birder will want to buy, but I highly recommend it for anyone expanding birdwatching beyond their backyard feeders, or for those intrigued by gulls and their fascinating biology.
Overall Rating (on a scale of cool birds): Ross’s Gull (highest)
You can order The Gull Guide from your local independent bookstore, Buteo Books, or directly from Princeton University Press.Please tell them we sent you!
