In May 2011, after four years of life on McNutt's Island, we moved to Montreal. This blog remains, though, as a (sort of) daily record of our time on the island, and a winding path for anyone who would like to meander about among its magical places. For additional perspectives and insights I recommend Greg's book, Island Year: Finding Nova Scotia (2010), and my Bowl of Light (2012). I'll continue to post once in a while. If you do want to read this blog, one option would be to begin at the beginning of it (which is, as we all know, in blog-world, at the end), and read forward, concluding with the most recent entry. It's a journal, really, so it does makes more sense if you read it that way. But, you know, read it any way you like.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Gulls nesting

Last evening I walked over to the Point, the cobble barrier that is the southern arm of the western cove.  I walked all the way out to the end before the gulls made any objection, and even then there were only six or seven of them wheeling about in the sky above the cove water. I had thought their behaviour would alert me as I came near a nest. But when I did, the gulls only continued to monitor my presence from their airy world. 
It was a beautiful nest, constructed mostly of eel grass and marsh grass. It was built right on the cobbles, on the leeward side of the point, above the high tideline. This is where sheep often graze for kelp. I wonder that they don't step on the nest. 

The eggs are about nine centimetres (maybe three and a half inches) long. Their colours are so like many of the stones that make up the cobble beach: a pale warm grey, with flecks of  bronze and brown.  

Gulls are sometimes under-appreciated creatures, what with their raucous, aggressive ways and their talent for scavenging. But their eggs are nothing less than wondrous, anyway.  
Garrett counted sixty three gulls' eggs on the Horseshoe last weekend. But these are the only ones I found on the Point. 

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