Immigrants from the NW and Poland

Nope, this isn't a Daily Mail style rant about London's growing population. After checking the river by our flat and then the lake at Burgess Park early doors with again no Med Gull, I headed to school for a few hours and the gulling had to be interrupted. While I was ramming the usefulness of different flood defence methods down my GCSE students' necks for their exam early next week, Kev J and Mick S had pulled a winger out of the bag at Crayford. A nice 2nd-winter Iceland Gull and, believe it or not, the first I'd seen this winter.

A couple of my shots showed a fairly obvious tail band but this really wasn't the case in the flesh, and highlights the danger of going off single images for some identifications. For some reason, this year's influx/wreck seem to have a disproportionate amount of this age.

So, having been able to enjoy a gull without a little bit of head scratching, it was back to Cross Ness where this bird was straight out from where I parked my car and on the Thames foreshore. What was immediately apparent was that it looked like a Caspian Gull and, a first for me, it was wearing a bit of bling.

Note the green ring with white writing on the right tarsus

Dobry wieczor!

Pretty confident that the green ring this bird was wearing meant that it'd be from Poland (yeah, home to mixed colonies of cachinnans, michahellis and argentatus!), I vaguely recalled that Dom had a ringed Casp from that neck of the woods a short while back at Rainham. So I texted him whilst Kev J, Mick S and I watched this eastern block of a bird. I was struggling with the wind to read the ring, as well as the bird being on the tideline being meaning its feet were in the water. But I managed to get '3P' as the last couple of digits before Dom's text arrived saying '355P'. Bang... nice stuff and it is the same bird that was superbly photographed by Dom here (note the totally different stance/jizz as today the bird was facing into a fierce blow) and Mick S will have much better shots at some point here from today. Aged as a near adult due to the fact that it had retained dark markings on the primary-coverts, these match up too with those on Dom's images.

Nice pale outer web to P10 with large white subterminal mirrors to both P9 and P10; also note the retained feathering on the primary coverts ageing it as a near adult/4th winter

Typically long-winged feel to the bird with a small beady eye even obvious in this flight shot

The bird was ringed in 2008, apparently in a mixed colony and unidentified at the time(!) like all pullus ringed in such situations - so this just shows the events we're dealing with when it comes to birds over here. By probability, you've got to assume that a lot of our Caspian-type birds are from the west/northwest of the range and the gene pool is rather diluted. Makes a change though for field birders to be telling ringers what their birds are... or at least trying to.

And dobry wieczor is good afternoon in Polish.

(S?)AHG at Nimmo's Pier

I've got one of those stinking head colds, feel dog rough and my head is banging. So what do I go and do - decide to have a punt at the Nimmo's Pier adult smithsonianus - a bird I've seen almost annually in recent years.

This bird hasn't come back yet this winter (though it wasn't seen until 5th February last year), but it's interesting to look at this bird in the light of what I saw in Ontario, the Corvo bird in October 2011, the Adriaens & Mactavish article and then some correspondence I've been having with a Canadian guller Kevin McLaughlin. Here are some shots (the first two are mine, and I'd like to thank Tom Cuffe for the four excellent flight shots): -

Photo 1. adult American Herring Gull, Nimmo's Pier, Galway, Ireland March 2008; note the heavy rather blotchy head and neck shawl

Photo 2. It was a big, bulky bird in the field; this shot shows a nice P10 mirror, with an extensive black tip and no obvious signs of a pale tongue on the inner web of this feather either (which you'd be looking for on a 'classic' Newfoundland bird) 

Photo 3. A small mirror to P10 on this photo, as well as a subterminal black 'U' to P5

Photo 4. There's an obvious lack of any pale tongue to the outer primary, P10.

Photo 5. Another photo that illustrates the lack of a pale tongue to the underside of P10, and shows nicely the subterminal 'U' on P5.

Photo 6. Note the solid black to the webs of P8-P10. You'd be expecting much more extensive grey inner webs to P8 and P9 on classic Newfoundland birds.

So what do all these features mean? Well, you're never going to be able to know for sure but there are a couple of things that go against this bird being a classic Newfoundland bird: -
- the lack of a pale tongue to P10
- one mirror on P10 only
- the inner webs to the outer primaries (P8-P10) are wholly dark with no obvious grey bleeding through, which is an obvious feature of Newfoundland birds.

Compare Photo 6 with this bird I took in Ontario in December 2011: -

Photo 7. Pretty similar in extent of black on P8 to P10 compared to the Nimmo's bird, with no grey bleeding through on the inner webs to the outer primaries

And then Photo 5 with this bird from Ontario too: -

Photo 8. Note the similar mirror to P10 and also the similarity of the darkness extending down on P10.

So what is the Nimmo's Pier bird. Is it a 'southern' American Herring Gull i.e. a bird from the Great Lakes? You can only speculate of course, but the feedback from Canadians on the Nimmo's bird is that it shows an outer wing pattern very much like the prototype AHG that breeds in Hamilton [Ontario]... and shows an average sized mirror confined to P10. It most certainly does not resemble a typical NAHG (Newfoundland type)'.

Though I'm sure some stuff about this bird has been written somewhere else on the web, perhaps this is of interest. In conclusion, this bird doesn't fit a classic Newfoundland bird (NAHG) - it doesn't exhibit that pale inner web (tongue) to P10 a la Caspian Gull - and if it hadn't been tracked throughout its life (having first turned up as a juvenile in 2004), then I imagine it would have slipped through the net.

Thanks to Kevin McLaughlin, Derek Charles and Tom Cuffe.

Bagging them up

I mentioned that the Saturday just gone I'd joined the NTGG, and helped out in just a small way with the 276 gulls ringed. I must say that I was extremely impressed with the professionalism and concern for the welfare of the birds, as well as the openness of Paul et al in letting me come along and see what happens.

As it turned out, it was a really tricky day, as the gulls just wouldn't settle in the range of the nets despite the compactor drivers really trying hard to entice them down. While all this was happening, I joined Chris and Richard and scanned the tip. I picked out a 1st-winter Caspian Gull and an adult Yellow-legged Gull but due to the sunlight and where they were tipping, the main feeding frenzy was just out of view. A couple of Sussex-ringed, rehabilitated Herring Gulls (an adult and a first-winter) as well as a 1st-winter Great Black-backed Gull that had been ringed in Norway. And then all of a sudden it went bang and this is what happened...

The captured gulls were all really docile, and seemed to know what was going on more or less. We bagged them all and then they all got ringed on site - unlike the dinner queue at school, where the big ones go first, it was Black-heads, then Commons, Herrings and then the brutish GBBs that scurried around in their bags like nothing I'd ever seen before. And then they bit a few people for good measure once extracted and being ringed.

Smile... more on this character at some other point

Fudge Find

I had another good day out close to home today; always the best way, grilling birds along the river and in the parks of southeast London. As it turned out, the best bird seen was at the last site visited - Thamesmere; a small lake by the Morrison's car park in salubrious Thamesmead. John A and I stopped off here on the way home, as we'd had enough of the cold and, away from the main flock of aythyas initially and hiding in the reeds, I found a female Ferruginous Duck. Probably the first for the London borough of Greenwich apparently. It was with 30 Pochard and 15 Tufted Duck, looked wild and didn't seem to show any hybrid characters. Apologies for the shots... my digiscoping camera battery had ran out and it was just a bit too distant for the SLR as these illustrate.

female Ferruginous Duck at Thamesmere

So, what else happened today? I got to Greenland Pier in the hope that Dave Mo's Brent Goose from Battersea would make it downriver to Rotherhithe, but it had other ideas. Had a 1st-winter Yellow-legged Gull on the groynes, and then it was off to check Burgess Park for a bit - no Med Gull again (I haven't seen it since early December) but there was a NTGG-ringed (red/orange ring with black writing) 1st-winter Herring Gull I'd not seen before.

1st-winter Yellow-legged Gull, Rotherhithe

So I sacked it off and headed a short way east to Crossness late morning. John A had already scored heavily with 11 Tundra Bean Geese east early morning, so I met him at Southmere where he quickly found this bird. Initially it looked absolutely bang on for a Casp with a nice slightly dark grey mantle, long parallel-sided bill, long-winged and significant white in the primaries. However this bird shows a relatively large, pale eye and although there's a nice white tip to P10, there's quite a significant amount of dark in the primary shaft. Could this bird possibly be something from the hybrid zone in Poland? Not sure and any useful comments appreciated.

I needed some grub after this perplexing ordeal, so headed off to get a pasty, while in the meantime missed an adult Kittiwake off the golf centre. Serves me right for again not making sandwiches. Anyway, there was a nice selection of bits and pieces, including a load of large g's on the mud - including three with bling. One NTGG group Herring Gull, a Suffolk-ringed Herring Gull and then a Norwegian Great Black-backed Gull.

JN252; ringed at Keila, Hjelmsøy, Måsøy, Finnmark, Norway on 11th June 2008 and this was the first recovery - a straight line distance of 1313 miles

More head scratching as we found another gull on the Thames foreshore. A real beast of a bird, obviously massive and leggy - just look at its size compared to the GBB! I had a 1st-winter Casp on the river a couple of years ago that almost matched this bird in size.

This bird was a near-adult, presumably a 4th winter with some dark smudgings on its primary coverts. Stilt legs, though not too spindly.

Then in flight this bird showed what you want in a Casp, with a nice pale tongue to the underside of P10.

Obviously this bird lacks a bit of maturity, but the wingtips seem pretty developed with an obvious pale outer web to the underside of P10. However, argentatus Herring Gulls can show pretty similar primary patterning to Casps - just compare this wing of an argentatus that I photographed in the hand yesterday.

Extensive pale tip to P10 and lack of any black on P5 put this within the range of argentatus in the ringer's book

Gulls - the good and the ugly

In from a bit of a manic day, travelling down to Dungeness for my final KOS rarities panel meeting - 5 years done and dusted, enjoyed my time and I'd recommend anyone to do something like this at some stage if they can. The half hour before the meeting was spent with a longstaying northern beast of a Glaucous Gull.

the resident 3cy Glauc at Dunge

Before this, I had an early start and a morning with the gulls and the NTGG this morning. Really enjoyed it and learnt a lot about Herring Gulls too, with several argentatus studied in the hand; useful to understand how they're raced... more to come at some stage on this.

gulls on the tip

A nice adult Herring Gull

but not everyone is born with good looks...

SAHG

Photo 1. The adult culprit, Corvo, October 2011

You may remember back in late October I posted about a ‘Herring Gull’ that I saw on Corvo. Expert commentary on this came from Peter Adriaens, co-author of the seminal paper on adults in a European context (pdf of it here) – and he was helpful and honest as ever.

Peter concluded that there was nothing wrong for it being an American Herring Gull, but the lack of a Casp-like long pale tongue on P10 immediately reduced the chances of reliable identification. 69% of Newfoundland birds ('northern' American Herring Gulls, NAHGs) showed this feature in the sample that his article is based on. Pro AHG features included the all black outer edge to P10 (not broken by the white mirror) and the thin black W pattern on P5; as well as some bayoneting.

Photo 2. Note the leading edge of the wing is black, not broken by the P10 mirror and there is no mirror on P9. 90% of SAHGs show no mirror in P9 just like this. Keep reading...

I bloody said it at the time to Arthur when we saw the bird ‘I bet this is an American Herring Gull, it feels like one, looks like one but reckon it’s not one of those classics so we’ll never 100% clinch it’. And so I was right. This was not a pale-tongued NAHG that you could do for sure.

Photo 3. Still looks a real brute alongside this 1cy atlantis Yellow-legged Gull

So, I kind of left it at that, relatively happy that I’d remain unhappy with the predicament of being closer than close but never a cigar. Roll on December 2011 and a Canadian trip. Here I met up with some local gullers, and this is where my eyes really started to open. These guys watch AHGs all the time, know them inside out - better than us Europeans claiming expert status on sporadic trips/internet birding - and just like we make calls on argentatus and argenteus, it’s possible to make judgements on SAHGs (Great Lake birds) and NAHGs in the field. Interesting stuff.

Photo 4. adult SAHG, Toronto, December 2011; a classic individual, if not with a sightly larger than average white mirror in P10 that extends onto the leading edge of wing. Look at underside of P10 where the black extends way down the primary shaft, with no inkling of that casp-like pale tongue.

Photo 5. Compare the upperside of this bird's left wing (P5 to P10) with that of photo 2. Looks pretty bang on to me.

Kevin McLaughlin has really helped me out and I’ll be eternally grateful for this. SAHGs normally either show a wing pattern of a variable mirror on P10 (sometimes breaching the outer web) OR occasionally a mirror on P10 and a smaller mirror on P9, and a nice subterminal band on P5. The SAHGs in Toronto/Niagara also tallied with what Adriaens and Mactavish said about these birds compared to the Newfoundland NAHGs – ‘shorter grey tongues to P8-10, often no white mirror on P9 (in 90% of those examined), usually a complete black band on p5, and some black on p4 in quite a few birds. All birds had an uninterrupted black band between the white mirror and tip of P10.’

Photo 6. The exception rather than the norm - a SAHG with mirrors on P9 and P10, the latter extending across both webs.

Photo 7. An example of a SAHG with a black marking in P4; it seems as though this bird has dropped P6

Adriaens and Mactavish went on to say that SAHGs appeared smaller, with shorter legs, less sturdy bills, and more rounded heads than Newfoundland birds. So, what with these SAHGs not showing a pale square-ended tongue to the underside of P10 like your classic NAHGs, in a European context you’re more or less f*cked to be able to pick these boys out than brutish NAHGs?

Photo 8. Short-legged and variable head streaking. What I did find was that SAHGs leg colour was consistently bubblegum pink unlike the variability we see in European birds. Compare to photos 1 and 3.

I’ll come to that in a few days... or has a SAHG already occurred in Europe? It's certainly a less than classic NAHG. Have a look here and: -

Photo 9. The regular Nimmo's AHG. Any chance this bird would have passed the test if it hadn't been tracked? I'm currently looking for some underwing shots in flight, so if you have any please email me.

Birthday gulling

Sorry if you thought that I'd been to Killybegs, judging by the title. But unfortunately the hordes of white-winged gulls in the north and the west will have to wait a few weeks... but I'll be there for sure, in what seems to be a bumper year for wingers given the recent dearth over the last couple of winters.

But back to today. I had a lie in of sorts, jolly well deserved given it was my birthday. Just as I'd got up and about, John A called to say that Kittiwakes were on the move at Crossness; he'd had 6 west (upriver and in my direction) in half an hour. So I got ready and walked the 100 metres or so to Greenland Pier. Predictably nada in the Kittiwake scores (I've only ever had a couple here) but a 3rd-winter Yellow-legged Gull - complete with its blood red orbital ring - was at home on one of the groynes by the Thames Clipper stop. It felt like a truly urban gull, and the first one of the year here in Rotherhithe (had a couple - different birds - at the back end of 2011).

3rd-winter Yellow-legged Gull

Mooched around, had a nice brunch at a restaurant locally, read a couple of Black-headed Gull rings (the Belgian bird from 28th December was still around, along with some BTO rings), photographed some common stuff to pass the time and that was that. Another weekend gone.

1st-winter Common Gull