Northern Gannet on Lake Erie!

Last Sunday, December 4, I took a trip to one of my favorite Lake Erie hotspots, the municipal pier at Huron, Ohio, in Erie County. I was undecided about any trip until late the night before, due to some pending projects, but ultimately felt it was in my best interest to get out for a while and try to trip the shutter on some interesting targets. And I found a completely unexpected and mega-interesting target.

A juvenile Northern Gannet (Morus bassanus)! The mouth of the Huron River and nearby Lake Erie was teeming with gulls, mostly Ring-billed and Herring gulls. A smattering of Bonaparte's Gulls, and at least one Lesser Black-backed and a few Great Black-backed gulls, too. I had walked out to the furthest southwestern corner of the riprap wall surrounding the huge dredge impoundment on the west side of the pier, as this position offered a commanding view of the action, and the light was good.

I wasn't in position for ten minutes when I saw an enormous bird cruise in from the direction of the open lake. I got my big lens on it ASAP and verified that it was indeed a gannet. The camera was all set for action, as I was already focused on shooting birds in flight. The Canon R5 was in electronic shutter mode, which yields a burst rate of 20 frames a second. Unfortunately, the gannet was at a distance of perhaps a quarter mile or so and never came nearer than that. But fortunately, I was shooting with the Canon 800mm f/5.6 lens, and had the 1.4x extender attached, making for an 1120 mm lens. Even with that firepower, this image was the best that I could do - and it's extremely cropped - but it leaves no question regarding the identification.

Northern Gannets are certainly not unprecedented on Lake Erie, but they are great rarities. They appear every few years, but I think the last report prior to this one dates to 2017. It's the third gannet that I've seen on Lake Erie.

Within a few minutes of the bird vanishing towards Cedar Point to the west (I got to watch it for perhaps 2-3 minutes) I got word out to the birding community via Facebook. And scuttled my other plans to hit other lakefront locales. I proceeded out to the end of the pier, which offers a commanding view of Lake Erie, and hoped the big bird would reappear. A number of other birders stopped by as well, but at least by the time that I left around 3:30, the gannet had not reappeared. Hopefully it will turn up in the area again and others can see it. The lake between Huron and Cleveland is the zone for wayward gannets on Lake Erie, and that's where most Ohio records come from.

This is the first image that I took of the gannet, shortly after spotting it. The big seabird dwarfs the nearby Ring-billed Gull.

I suspect that gannets that appear on Lake Erie or elsewhere on the Great Lakes originate from the massive colony (100,000+ birds!) on Bonaventure Island at Perce, Quebec. That's the red dot on the Google Earth map above. "Ile Bonaventure" sits at the terminus of the Gaspe Peninsula, in the expansive Gulf of St. Lawrence. This is the outflow for the entirety of the Great Lakes. I believe all Ohio gannet records are of juveniles. Apparently, the naive youngsters mistake west for east, and instead of heading out into the Atlantic Ocean to winter with the other gannets, the wayward birds head up the St. Lawrence River and inland. They pass by the iconic Canadian cities of Montreal and Toronto, through Lake Ontario, on past Niagara Falls and up the Niagara River, and into Lake Erie. It's about 1,100 miles from Bonaventure Island to Huron, Ohio, as the gannet would fly.

A juvenile Northern Gannet in the Atlantic Ocean off Ocean City, Maryland. I made this image on February 27, 2022, during a pelagic seabird trip run by George Armistead and his company, Hillstar Nature. We saw many gannets, of all ages.

It takes gannets 4-5 years to attain full adult plumage. After their first (juvenile) year in which they are all brown like the bird that I photographed, immature gannets start to develop a patchwork of white. In general, they go from darker to whiter but there is great plumage variability even among gannets of the same age. All or virtually all Lake Erie gannet records are of brown first-year birds.

A smattering of the 100,000+ Northern Gannets that nest on Bonaventure Island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. This is the likely source of origin for wayward juvenile gannets that appear on the Great Lakes. I made this image on July 1, 2018.

Huron, on Lake Erie, is a bird-watcher's paradise

Huron, on Lake Erie, is a bird-watcher's paradise

COLUMBUS DISPATCH
December 6, 2015

NATURE
Jim McCormac

HURON, Ohio — I recently traveled to the Lake Erie town of Huron, population 7,000. Huron, which was voted one of “America’s Coolest Small Towns” for 2015 by Budget Travel magazine, is the epicenter of Erie County bird-watching.

Our second-smallest county is probably best-known as the birthplace of Thomas Alva Edison and the home of Cedar Point. It also hosts a remarkable suite of Lake Erie bird-watching hot spots.

Bookending Huron is Old Woman Creek National Estuarine Research Reserve and Sheldon Marsh State Nature Preserve. Three miles downstream on the Huron River is another state nature preserve, DuPont Marsh.

My destination was yet another hot spot, the municipal pier at the confluence of the Huron River and Lake Erie in the middle of town. The half-mile-long pier’s terminus puts observers in a fantastic location to spot birds.

November and December brings the most birds to Huron. The concentrations of red-breasted mergansers can be staggering. One-day estimates of these fish-eating ducks can range into the tens of thousands. Massive flocks resemble storm clouds scudding over Lake Erie.

The mergansers are joined by thousands of gulls, most notably Bonaparte’s gulls. They’re there for the fish, too. Lake Erie’s abundant fishery accounts for most of late fall and early winter’s avian bounty. Emerald shiners and gizzard shad probably form the bulk of the food base.

My fellow observers and I noted hundreds of common loons near the river mouth. They were accompanied by hundreds of horned grebes, another diving fish eater.

Birders love to find rare birds, and Huron has an amazing track record. At least three first state records have been found, and lesser rarities are almost to be expected on a good day.

My trip was successful on the rarity front. Best was a Pacific loon found by Robert Hershberger, an Amish optics vendor and ace birder. The first recorded sighting of the bird in Ohio was in this same spot in 1985, and only a handful have been reported since.

We saw three jaegers, which are Arctic-nesting gull-like birds that pirate fish from other birds. Both white-winged and black scoters landed nearby, offering good looks. Sometimes dozens or even hundreds of these sea ducks can be seen here. At day’s end, I found an eared grebe in the river. Only a few turn up in Ohio each year.

In terms of sheer spectacle, the red-breasted mergansers stole the show. At one point, a feed swarm numbering over 10,000 birds stretched for perhaps a quarter-mile just offshore. Many other flocks, large and small, continually passed by in the distance.

Lake Erie is an incredibly rich biological hot spot, and the birds bear this out. I hope we can do a better job of caring for it.

Naturalist Jim McCormac writes a column for The Dispatch on the first, third and fifth Sundays of the month. He also writes about nature at www.jimmccormac.blog spot.com.

Huron revisited, with rare birds

The mouth of the Huron River on a beautiful late November day. The Huron Municipal Pier stretches off into the distance, ending in Lake Erie. Look closely, and you'll see a white lighthouse-like signal tower at the end. I journeyed back to this locale last Sunday, arriving around 8 am, and immediately headed out to the signal tower at the pier's end. Temperature at the start was about 27 degrees F, warming to a high of 33. Still a bit too nice weatherwise for producing crazy bird numbers and diversity, but much better than my last Huron trip in that regard.

Some of the photos in this post are certainly not award winners. They are purely documentary, of rarities that did not cooperate with the photographer. While conducting lake watches and tallying the birds that pass by on Lake Erie is fun, it often does not produce great photo ops, at least of the more unusual stuff. Many of the birds are simply too far out for that.

Birds swarm the mouth of the Huron River. Most of them on the water are Red-breasted Mergansers, with numerous gulls overhead. An enormous feeding flock of mergansers settled in at the river's mouth towards day's end. At one point, the birds on the water stretched for a quarter mile or so, and there were probably 10,000 plus on the water, maybe more.

I spent most of my time on this foray at the base of the white tower, which offers a great perspective on the lake, and the river. Many birds fly by fairly closely at this point, and the abundant fishery spawned by the interface of river and lake lures scads of piscivorous birds into close proximity. Once ensconced at the tower's base, it's hard to leave, at least on an active day. And this day saw lots of action.

Gulls, overwhelmingly Ring-billed Gulls with lesser numbers of Herring Gulls, cram the little beach at the pier's beginning. Huron, Ohio, is one of the birdiest spots on Lake Erie. I've been traveling to our Great Lake for many years - hundreds of trips - and have seen firsthand nearly all the honey holes. This place is high on the list of my favorites, for two main reasons. One is the sheer number of birds that concentrate here. Only the most jaded or intellectually incurious would fail to be struck by the tens of thousands of gulls and ducks that swirl around the river mouth on a busy day.

Two, the prospect of rarities makes Huron a constant lure, especially in November and December. Ohio's first records of Pacific Loon, Spotted Redshank, and Arctic Tern came from here. I was in on the loon, back on December 7, 1985. While the possibility of mega-rarities always exists, lesser rarities are almost to be expected here, which always spices up a trip.

We can thank the fish for the spectacular bird concentrations here, and elsewhere on Lake Erie. An adult Bonaparte's Gull attempts to quickly choke down a gizzard shad that it just deftly plucked from the water. If the little gull doesn't act fast, it will quickly be set upon by larger gulls who will attempt to pirate the fish. Theft such as this is known as kleptoparasitism, and kleptoparasitic incidents are frequent as scores of thuggish larger gulls stalk the hard-working Bonaparte's Gulls. I'll show you one of the kings of kelptoparasitism in a minute.

This photo, which I made from the aforementioned signal tower, is classic late November Huron action. A Bonaparte's Gull hovers over some fish, while a Common Loon looks on. To the far right, head peeking above a wave, is a much smaller Horned Grebe. One-day estimates numbering into the tens of thousands have been made here for the gull. While this day's Bonaparte's tally was only a few thousand, at best, the Horned Grebe total was huge. They were everywhere, and I saw at least 300 from my lakeside perch.

Ah! A much better look at one of the hundreds of Common Loons that were in the area. Lake Erie is a major migratory corridor for loons, and if I saw a few hundred from this one spot on this one day, I wonder how many were on the lake in its entirety. Most regular birders along the lake that I've talked to are reporting large numbers of loons this fall.

This was "Bird of the Day", to be sure. While I was holed up on the east side of the tower, out of the wind, Robert Hershberger and crew showed up but stayed over on the breakwall. When I finally walked around to say hello, Robert gestured wildly and I quickly transited the rough limestone blocks that separate pier and breakwall. He had spotted this Pacific Loon, well out in the lake and off to the west. This is the species that was first found in Ohio in nearly the same spot, 30 years ago.

The photo is not great, but it is identifiable. This species is noticeably smaller and trimmer than the Common Loon, which was quite evident when the two were in close proximity. It also has a much more rounded head, unlike the big blockhead look of a Common Loon. The bill is thinner and less massive, and the neck is much more clearly patterned in a tri-tone effect: white throat, dark sides, and lighter brownish-gray on the nape. This bird is a juvenile, as evidenced by the white checkerboarding on the back.

The Pacific Loon stayed near the river mouth the entire time, but well out on the lake. I made this image later in the day, which shows another Pacific Loon field mark, that delicate little chinstrap under the bill. While it may appear that the bird must have been fairly close, this image was made with the Canon 5D Mark III mounted to Canon's 500mm f/4 II lens. A 1.4x teleconverter was sandwiched between camera and lens, making for a focal length of 700mm. Then the photo was hugely cropped down. In reality, the bird was visible but not identifiable with the naked eye, and barely identifiable through binoculars if the observer knew the species well.

Since the inaugural 1985 Huron Pacific Loon, there have been at least a half-dozen other indisputable records, probably more. Hot on the heels of this bird were two others found in the Cleveland area. It may be that 1) there are more Pacific Loons these days, leading to more vagrants; 2) they have altered their migratory pattern somewhat, or 3) birders are becoming more adept at finding and recognizing them. I vote for #3.

A handsome little bird indeed is the Horned Grebe. Click the photo to enlarge, and admire its rubylike eye. Note also the massive lobed feet trailing behind. Like their close allies the loons, these grebes are expert divers. I don't think I've ever seen so many Horned Grebes at one spot as I did this day. Hundreds were out on the lake, and many would obliging swim near my outpost on the tower, or near the pier in the river.

At the very end of the day, I made one last scan of the river, and noticed this pod of four grebes. Their ranks included another rarity! The three on the left are Horned Grebes, while the bird on the right is an Eared Grebe. Note its smaller size, duskier face, and steep forehead and peaked crown. A handful of Eared Grebes are reported annually in the state, and it's always a treat to encounter one.

While I was standing on the breakwall with Robert, he spotted this White-winged Scoter in flight, and the bird put down offshore for a few minutes. A bit later, I spotted a Black Scoter skimming along, and it also settled on the water for us to admire. In general, scoters were scarce this day, and I only saw five or so. On the best November days - usually when the weather is the absolute worst for bipedal observers - dozens or hundreds of scoters might fly by this point.

Between Robert and I, we saw at least three jaegers. I spotted this bird well out on the lake as it streaked over the waves heading west. None of the jaegers came into the river and hung out, as we were hoping. This bird is an immature, as most Ohio jaegers are. I believe it is a Pomarine Jaeger, due to the double flash of white under the wings at the base of the primary feathers, and the strongly two-toned bill. In the field, it had a large bulky appearance; an impression given by the largest of our jaegers. As always, though, I welcome corrections from those who may know better. I certainly do not see many jaegers and am no expert on their identification.

Jaegers are the Kings of Kleptoparasitism. They make much of their living by hounding gulls and terns in spectacular aerial chases, eventually forcing the victim to disgorge its fishy catch. Watching one in the act of mugging some hard-working fish-catcher is truly impressive, and that's what I was hoping for this day. But the jaegers that we saw apparently had business elsewhere and didn't linger.

A squadron of Red-breasted Mergansers shoots by, two males in molt and seven females. At least 10,000 and probably far more than that of these fish-eating ducks swarmed in the area on this day. The peak passage of Red-breasted Mergansers in November on this part of Lake Erie is truly impressive. I made many images of these birds on this day, and want to discuss them in a separate post.

Gulls, doing interesting things

UPDATE: Note below that I lamented the too nice weather during my trip last Wednesday. Well, the weather changed big time the following day, and a few Cave Swallows, a Red Phalarope, and two Franklin's Gulls were found at this very spot yesterday. Then, 22 Franklin's Gulls were in about the exact spot where I photographed the Lesser Black-backed Gull this morning. Bad weather means good birding along Lake Erie.

I visited one of my favorite Lake Erie haunts yesterday, Huron, Ohio and its famed municipal pier. This is stop #46 on the Lake Erie Birding Trail, and one of the lake's true birding hotspots. I've been coming here for many, many years, and have seen lots of great birds from this pier.

My hope was for bad weather, and my plan was to perch by the lighthouse at the pier's end and conduct a "sea watch". Rough weather in November can produce lots of scoters, big numbers of gulls, and perhaps jaegers or other rarities such as Red Phalarope. Alas, the weather was too nice - calm seas and very Indian Summerish, with temps ultimately hitting 60F. Nonetheless, I trundled out the 6/10th mile long pier to the end, with much gear in hand, to see what might happen.

Not much was going on at the lighthouse, which wasn't surprising. The lake was flat and waveless, and skies were blue. Well, at least the light was great for making photographs, so that's what I did. This juvenile Bonaparte's Gull was making a regular loop around the lighthouse, so I committed him/her to pixels. On a cold blustery day in November or December, the Huron River and adjacent Lake Erie can swarm with many thousands of these small gulls, and big concentrations often have rarities like Little Gull in their ranks.

There is a small peaty beach just a stone's throw west of the pier at its juncture with the mainland, and I was pleased to find this beautiful Lesser Black-backed Gull there on my return. I was able to make a wonderful series of images of the bird. I wrote a thumbnail sketch of its status in North America and Ohio a few years back; RIGHT HERE.

The early morning light offered near-perfect illumination of the several hundred gulls that roosted on the beach and nearshore waters. Given the unlikelihood of rarities due to the nice weather, I settled in to watch the gulls for a while, and secure some images.

Shooting sitting gulls isn't exactly difficult. They're pretty big, and usually relatively unwary. Thus, to avoid gull shots that look like 10,000 other gull shots, I like to try and catch them doing something interesting. If you wait and watch long enough, they will.

An adult Herring Gull, sporting the dappled browns of its winter plumage, drops its pink landing gear.

Flying gulls are a few notches up the difficulty scale from perched gulls, but still not too tough to pull off. They are often predictable in their flight patterns, and depending on the wind, frequently fly with a rather languid manner. However, capturing good images of certain of their aerial hijinks can be hard.

An adult Ring-billed Gull drops to the water.

Much of one's success with shooting flying birds, gulls or otherwise, depends on how the camera is set up, and the type of lens that is used. A fast shutter speed is essential, obviously. I shot this image and those that follow at 1/2000 of a second, give or take.

A Ring-billed Gull jumps from the water, creating mini waterspouts. The Ring-bill is by far the most common gull in Ohio, in most places at most seasons. As winter sets in on Lake Erie, their numbers will often be matched or bested by Herring Gulls. But on this day, the Ring-billed Gulls were the dominant gull. I've got scads of images of them, but the lighting and overall setup in this spot was too good to pass up.

One interesting gull habit that you may have noticed is their tendency to execute a brief rather violent shimmy soon after take off from water. This hard shake blasts the water from the plumage, and in the process the gull's contortions take on some interesting appearances. I spent quite a bit of time and effort trying to freeze the birds in mid shimmy-shake. It isn't as easy as it might seem. In spite of having a pretty good idea that a recently launched bird might do this, it's still a bit tough to track it smoothly with the camera, and freeze the action. This Ring-billed Gull is in the midst of some interesting water-shedding gyrations.

This image was made at 1/2500, and it still didn't totally freeze the violent wing thrusts of this Ring-billed Gull as it shook fiercely in midair. Notice the turbulence buffeting its primary (outermost) flight feathers.

This is what I was really trying for, and the vast majority of my efforts failed. This one, though, is a keeper. When the gulls do their shimmy shake, they often briefly invert their head and it looks like they are flying upside down. This whole shake and shudder stunt lasts only a second or two, and the bird will only be in this head down position for a fraction of a second.

Watching birds' behavior, even very common species, can sometimes reveal interesting opportunities to make out of the ordinary photographs.