I went up to Alum Creek State Park today. My first stop was the beach. The sun was just coming up and the gulls were beginning to wake up. There were ring-billed gulls and herring gulls of varying ages. Then the Bonaparte's gulls showed up. There wasn't much else at the beach except some Canada geese, a double crested cormorant, and I flyover by an American Pipit so I walked over to the dam. From the dam I saw 14 ruddy ducks, 32 American coots, mallards, a pied- billed grebe, and a horned grebe. Then I walked back over to the beach. The sun was higher so there was more activity at the beach. A couple more American pipits flew over, a common loon was fishing about a hundred yards out in the water, the Bonaparte's gulls were making so much noise and diving into the water catching fish, and some horned larks were finding something good to eat on the ground behind the sign with the big 2 on it. Al La Sala Columbus, OH ______________________________________________________________________ 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]