Despite being in my fourth year of nest surveying, the rapid events of late June never fail to take me by surprise. On this survey I spotted many chicks, as well as a new nest. Here we go…
By the time I arrived at Cambie Nest the day was heating up significantly. The two chicks we spotted last week – now around 8-10 days old – were hanging back in the shade, making it difficult to get good photographs.
I arrived at the Cambie Nest just as the parents were switching out their duties – and I spotted some tiny chicks, no more than a few days old. Worried that the adult would immediately start brooding, I unpacked my camera as quickly as I could. There’s still one unhatched egg – the egg in the background is broken, almost certainly the remains of the egg one of these two chicks emerged from.
Fortunately, the newly arrived gull stayed off the nest and tried to feed the chicks…
Walking home from work last week, I saw that the west side of the Cambie Street Bridge was no longer closed for repairs. This morning I was able to visit Cambie Nest. This nest is one of the closest and most visible nests, making for many great observations in the past years.
I found the nest in the same location as previous years, with a gull brooding in the morning sun.
This year I’ve started using QGIS instead of google maps to keep track of gull nest data. QGIS is a free and incredibly powerful geographic information system. I’m a novice user but I’m using this opportunity to start learning. Click on the above image to be taken to an interactive map – you can click on each nest and see the information I’ve gathered so far.
