Tuesday 19 November 2013

Gulls again...

After a brief interlude of passerine ringing, it’s back to gulls. And judging by the success (or lack of it) of my last Clouds Hill session, this blog might resort back to pictures of Med Gulls and ring reading for the foreseeable future. Not trying to put you off or anything....
Springs tides have allowed the water level at Radipole to drop nice and low which always attracts good number of gulls. Constant scanning throughout the day only produced one slight oddity and that was this gorgeous 3rd winter Yellow-legged Gull.



Think back to my deep state of confusion regarding a 3rd winter something or other a few weeks ago which I wrongly settled on Yellow-legged Gull. I said back then that if it was actually a  Yellow legger it would have been a lot more obvious. This bird took about 3 seconds to ID and no problems with this fella. It was bloody massive! Only other option would be a Herring x Great black backed Gull... joke...
However the clinging feature of a Yellow-legged Gull is the width of a full extended gape. This bird obliged and opened it’s gob and it measured an impressive 153mm which is well outside the range of Herring Gull.




Had a very pleasant evening watching 350+ Med Gulls fall out of the sky onto Radipole Lake. This happens most evening between 4 and 4:30 and it’s well worth seeing! I’ve had over 500 in the past do this. Much more impressive than watching them fly up and down the fleet though I wouldn't mind seeing the 1000+ currently wintering down there.

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