Approaching the Solomon River Valley in east-central Kansas this afternoon, I encountered a large flock of Franklin's gulls, flying southward. Over the next ten miles, I likely saw more than 500 of these agile travelers, migrating or stopping to strafe the roadside fields for grasshoppers and other insects.
Having bred in freshwater marshes across the Northern Plains, they are headed for the Pacific Coast of South America where they will spend the winter. Today, they were fighting a strong south wind that had pushed the afternoon high into the mid 80s F.
One might wonder why they are intent on heading south when summer-like temperatures persist across the Plains. Of course, they have a long journey ahead and the timing of their migration evolved long before global warming began to develop. They instinctively "know" that October weather is fickle on the Great Plains and they must move on before an early winter storm decimates the prey that fuels their migration.
