New Hampshire Nature Notes
by Eric Orff

Lush leaves and a banded gull.

Thursday 05/19/2005

My week took another serendipitous bounce today, turning what was to be a rather normal day, kind of unique. ( A wildlife biologist never has a "normal" day, by the way) Although I often say how lucky I am, I also know that by far the majority of time we tend to FIND good luck. You have to be looking for it to find it.

I headed over to radio station WOKQ in Dover early this morning to do a couple new public service announcements. It's been a while since I have done a new one, although the station plays some of the appropriate ones I have done before on a daily basis. This month marks the beginning of my ninth year I have been doing the radio PSA's at WOKQ. Where does time go?

But I like to mix some new ones in as often as I can. The two I did today were in line with others I have done before. I did one about moose and deer car collisions and some tips on avoiding them. I asked the departments deer biologist to give me some number, of female deer and moose killed by cars per week for this time of year. For years I have had a sense that there is a spike in kills of cow moose and doe deer just before it is time to give birth. Sure enough, the records show, especially for moose, that the last week of May is deadly. About six percent of all the cow moose killed all year are killed the last week of May. The doe deer kill by cars spikes to a lesser degree, but is still high in late May into early June.

The second PSA was about the increased visibility of coyotes, foxes and fisher in early June when they are forced to hunt for pray during the day as the females wean their young. Of coarse every fox or coyote seen in a neighborhood during the day is considered rabid based on the calls I get. I also got an email answer that I posed to the state health folks a few days ago about fox rabies. There have been no cases of the arctic fox strain of rabies since 1999. It's just that these animals must hunt 24/7 to feed their young so become day critters as well.

I always keep an eye out for road killed animals, but today as I headed to the radio station to talk about road kills, I kept tabs of what I saw driving to Dover. A dead grouse, woodchuck, a raccoon, some large rags that looked like critters from a distance, and one sea gull on route 4 by the Scammel Bridge on Dover Point. It really peaked my interest as I don't very often see a car killed gull. In my mind I decided to check it out and take it away from the road on the way back to the office.

I talked about the road kills with the production manager Mark Williams as we recorded, and he magically "edited" my always one-read PSA's. A sales person came in and through in a comment " I saw a dead mountain lion, or cougar, on the side of I-95 in Kennebunk on my way in this morning".

As I approached the gull on the way to my office I pulled into the rest area and walked over to grab it and I was thinking of just tossing it into the bushes once I looked at it. Nope this one was coming with me! It had four leg bands on it. I wondered who in the heck is banding gulls. No one at the state level in NH knew when I got to the office and made some calls. I did call the 800 number on the band to report it to the US Fish and Wildlife Service Bird Banding Lab in Maryland. For me finding an odd bird, such as a gull banded, is pretty neat.

I did swing by the Bellamy Wildlife Management Area in Dover where I expected to see a completed job of removal of the illegally dumped fuel oil. Nope, they were still digging and removing soil. Looks like at least a four day job. Twice what was estimated on Tuesday. The good news for the hunters and fishermen is that there is a special state "illegal oil spill contingence fund" that will pay for the clean up. Now probably running close to $10,000! It is great news that the licensed sportsmen are not taking this one on the chin. Even at this site one of the workers began to list the road kills he had seen this morning coming to work including a dead deer on route 101. Seems like everyone had some road kill stories today.

Now I will anxiously await the report from the Bird Banding Lab the results of where, who and when the gull was banded. I have banded thousands of geese and ducks in my career as well as a few woodcock, swans, turkeys and song birds, not to mention the bear, deer and moose I have tagged. Still getting the results of a banded animal you have reported is pretty cool. I'll provide the story when I get it.