I have to echo Hans Clebsch's comments about the strange weather We were visiting my mother in Lorain today and on the way home decided to check out Lorain Harbor (4:30-5:30pm). It was the best i have seen it in a long time. There were several thousand gulls there. Conditions were absolutely terrible with gale force northeast winds and heavy rain. You needed to turn your car to either look out the windshield or so you could look out the west side. At the muni pier at the end of Oberlin Avenue there was a juvenile BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKE and an adult lesser black-backed gull. On the pier just west of the river mouth an immature SABINE'S GULL was flying in the slip west of the pier. West of the pier on the river there was an adult LITTLE GULL. A RED PHALAROPE was sitting amongst a group of Bonaparte's and ring-billed gulls on the pier. Also present were three dunlin. At the impoundment there were 4 adult lesser black-backed gulls and 3 HUDSONIAN GODWITS. They were not in the impoundment, but just west of it where the new lot it. The heavy rain has resulted in a lot of standing water there. Water in the impoundment seemed high. There were ruddy ducks, blue and green-winged teal and pintail in it. I did not get out because of the terrible weather and I didn't want to scare up the gulls. Once heading home, as you got east out of Lorain County the rain stopped and the winds died down quite a bit. At home here in Lake County, the roads are dry and the winds are not bad at all. To get an idea of this odd weather, check out the Cleveland radar. In addition to what I mentioned above here is what else was there: double-crested cormorant (320), Bonaparte's gull (850), ring-billed gull (8,000+), herring gull (350), great black-backed gull (24), common tern (70), Forster's tern (6), and Caspian tern (1) John Pogacnik 4765 Lockwood Road Perry, OH 44081 (440) 259-2751 ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]