Life among the Gulls

Note: for a day by day report on my stay on Race Rocks, please visit the official Ecoguardian Log.

There is no question who is in charge of Race Rocks in mid-August. It's the colony of Glaucous-winged Gulls. Given the age of most of the offspring, I can only imagine what it must be like in mid-July.

Glaucous-winged Gull defending turf.

One day, I walked around the main island with a clicker, and individually counted more than 640 Glaucous-winged Gulls on the ground. This would mean that there were easily more than 700 present given that many were out gathering food. While we're not talking a lot of diversity here, I was privileged to get a chance to learn a lot more about their behaviour. 

The adults were mostly still in pairs defending territories, some of which were in very inconvenient places--like the main sidewalk. It was really interesting watching the bonding behaviours of the pairs, even those with no chicks. They made me think of mini-albatrosses! Many of the pairs had from 1 to 3 chicks which they vigorously defended.  This gull was guarding one chick. Every time I walked down the sidewalk, it would threaten me, but only from behind. If I turned and looked at it, it would look away as if it hadn't been doing anything. It became a bit of a game over the course of the week.

Looking nonchalant now, this gull would charge me from behind every time I walked down the sidewalk.

Great Race is a small island, approximately 4.5 acres in area. The density of gulls, even in mid-August means that there is a lot of bickering, some more bluster than bite, but some quite serious.  Adults will viciously attack other gulls, even chicks, that cross the imaginary lines of their territories. Some of the attacks are lethal. I found it quite interesting that there were fully flighted young gulls as well as a few that were very young. I even found a random egg one night that was gone a couple days later. While I did my best to not disturb them, basically any movement would set the off, and just like dogs howling in a neighbourhood, a good portion of them would start yelling. 

Gull youngsters checking out an Elephant Seal in THEIR territory.

The youngsters all had their secret hiding spaces, so if you moved slowly enough, they'd run and tuck in while their parents came after you. 

One young gull had figured out that it could swim. It's the only one I saw in the water, but it went swimming every day.

Where there are gulls, there is gull excrement, and plenty of it. Keeping the solar panels clean was a priority, as they provide a good amount of the energy for the island.  Depending on the wind, the windows of the buildings became the landing places for what the birds dropped. 

The whole side of the house was splattered. My job was to keep the windows clean. The rest would be handled by occasional powerwashing.

Most of the solar panels had bird spikes to discourage roosting, but some of the birds were clever enough to figure out how to deal with them.

"I got this."

Can you see the band on the gull above?  For the full story, check out the Race Rocks Ecoguardian Log for August 12.

One of the most entertaining things was to watch the older chicks learning to fly. Watch a video here.

In addition to the Glaucous-winged Gull colony, on several mornings, California Gulls were present in the hundreds, feasting on krill that was in the area. Most had moved on by mid-morning, leaving only several dozen on the perimeter of the island.  They were smart enough not to enter the breeding colony.

Most days, there were also one or more Heermann's Gulls in the mix, and the occasional Herring Gull, but I wasn't able to find anything more unusual, despite picking through the flocks frequently.

Breeding will soon be over, just in time for the arrival of hundreds of seals!