Are there seagulls in Iowa?

rover

rover

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Or any other far inland place? I live some 45ish miles from the shore here and while in the Walmart parking lot my son asked why there were seagulls because we weren't on the beach. I explained they are scavengers and all that technical stuff, but he kept falling back on the "sea" part. So, how far inland have you seen them? I think I recall seeing them in Kentucky last year, but I really pay no mind to them so maybe I didn't.

Where do you live? Any seagulls around?
 
There are gulls here in Madison. They do need a largish body of water relatively near, but a decent sized lake will do for them. Annoying birds, even worse than pigeons.

William
 
I went to Canada's Wonderland amusement park yesterday. It's maybe 50 miles north of Lake Ontario. A woman I was standing beside got hit with seagull poop. They find lots to scavenge in the park from dropped frenchfries and icecreme cones.
 
LOL, Wayne! I thought they tasted like chicken.

Ralph, you can explain it to your son this way: Seagulls are called seagulls because way back when, that's were they hung out in order to find their source of food. Later as man began to change the landscape with industrialization and urbanization, the gulls were able to adapt and to utilize new sources of food: dumps and amusement parks. (and Kroger parking lots.)
 
One day I was surprised to find them hovering above me in the parking lot of a small mall in Chicago. And it wasn't even close to the lake, but well inland.

Funny... I closed my eyes and their screams made me feel as if I were in some beach. ;)
 
We've got them here in Cortland. They hang out at most of the fast food joint parking lots. Annoying, nasty creatures. Not sure about the precise distance to the ocean but it's usually five hours drivng time. Lake ontario is an hour and a half or two directly north. And there are all those finger lakes nearby. One of my friends told me once that they are not really "seagulls" but some related bird. Tern, maybe? I really only know about birds that are food(wild or domesticated) and I can't imagine how hungry I'd have to be to consider eating those gulls.
Rob
 
I'm in Delhi, pretty far from the Indian Ocean. A kid around the corner has a camera labelled Seagull. It speaks Mandarin, he says, but I wouldn't know if that's bird talk. Eats 35 mm film, which is also its poop.
 
Here are a couple of crappy photos of Sea Gulls on the Des Moines river in south east Iowa.

Sea-Gulls.gif


Sea-Gulls-2.gif


Wayne
 
I'm in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, and we have seagulls here. We're a two-day drive to the west coast, a five-day drive to the east coast and (if there were a road that far) probably a four-day drive to the north coast. (I guess you can drive to Tuktoyaktuk, but you'd need a 4x4. :) )

There are plenty of seagulls here.

The nearest lake, which isn't that big, is about 45 km away.

My experience has been that seagulls don't need the ocean or a lake. If there is food, they'll be around. And apparently, there is a lot of gull food in Regina.

Jim
 
payasam said:
I'm in Delhi, pretty far from the Indian Ocean. A kid around the corner has a camera labelled Seagull. It speaks Mandarin, he says, but I wouldn't know if that's bird talk. Eats 35 mm film, which is also its poop.
Click to expand...
:D Would that be the bird that laid golden, umm, never mind...:D
Rob
 
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