MA - evening at Barton Cove 03/14

The fantastic diving duck show continued at Barton Cove this evening and it was certainly good to see some familiar faces showing up to enjoy the spectacle. Remarkably, the drake Canvasback had been joined by a second male, the Redhead closely associating with them. The Ring-necked Ducks remained with perhaps as many as 40 present and the Red-breasted Merganser continued further upriver towards the Rod and Gun club. At the power canal a pair of Northern Pintail joined a flock of around a dozen American Black Ducks but aside from a pair of Bufflehead the power canal was pretty quiet. I tried to spend a bit of time on gulls this evening finding at least five Kumlien's Iceland Gulls at Barton Cove plus a nice first-cycle Glaucous Gull first picked up by Ian Davies. In between times I came across a small number of gulls on the roof of the Greenfield Savings Bank in Turner's Falls finding two Kumlien's Iceland Gulls and a third bird that was a little more intriguing, superficialy resembling a first-cycle Glaucous but ultimately not fitting Glaucous or Kumlien's particularly well.  For the time being I'm leaving that one unidentified.

 Redhead (male) with two Canvasbacks (males) - Barton Cove, Franklin Co., MA. March 14th, 2014. 

 Redhead (male) with two Canvasbacks (males) and Greater Scaup (female) - Barton Cove, Franklin Co., MA. March 14th, 2014. 

Northern Pintail (male, lower right) with American Black Duck - Turner's Falls, Franklin Co., MA.
March 14th, 2014.

Kumlien's Iceland Gull with unidentified Glaucous-like Gull (rear) - Turner's Falls, Franklin Co., MA. March 14th, 2014. 

Kumlien's Iceland Gull with unidentified Glaucous-like Gull (front) - Turner's Falls, Franklin Co., MA. March 14th, 2014. 

Unidentified bird superficially similar to Glaucous but lacks sharply demarcated black tip

to bill as well as being small for that species. 

Glaucous Gull (first-cycle) - Barton Cove, Franklin Co., MA. March 14th, 2014. 

Typically hulking Glaucous, a first year bird showing stout pink bill with cleanly demarcated black tip. 

 Kumlien's Iceland Gull (second-cyle) - Turner's Falls, Franklin Co., MA. March 14th, 2014.