[ctfphoto]

Originally Posted by taggermike

Heres some thing well worth studying. Especially in summer surface focussed fishing birds are your greatest friends and best fish finders. Birds are out there for one purpose, to find food. They're professionals, with millions of years of evolution perfecting them. Let them work for you. Every one knows a big flock of diving birds is great but most bird behavior is much more subtle. Species, calls, flight speed, distance off the water, and direction can all give information. Even birds doing nothing or their absence from an area can be informative. A yak is so quiet I often hear birds. And that can be very informative. Terms are the best indicators. They hunt in loose flocks that spread out to cover an area. They call constantly to keep contact with surrounding terns. When one finds or sees some thing its calls change. "Im here I'm here", "I'm looking I'm looking", "I see some thing I see some thing", "Food! Food!". That's my translation any way. When one tern finds fish and makes the call it pulls in the nearest circle of birds, the next circle of birds sees those and turns, and out the call spreads. Amazing yo see one tern diving and within a minutes there's a hundred. Its a great comunal hunting technique. If you see a few turns flying slowly and usually zig zaging in an area making contact calls, even if they're not actively diving, you're in the right place. Terms are best, but gulls, pelis, shearwaters, and even comorrants all have a story to tell. I got to rambling. Im a bird watcher. Hope this helped. Mike

This times 1000 .....well written.