Bonaparte's Gull in Eastbourne

I headed down to Eastbourne for a leisurely few hours by the seaside with David B. We ditched a car at Dartford where, coincidentally, there were 8 Waxwings and the showy Slavonian Grebe continued its residence on its favoured pool. It was late morning by the time we arrived at Princes Park, and there had been no sign despite all the long lenses. Within five minutes, I found the Bonaparte's Gull and this quality little, tree-nesting yank gull put on a show for the next few hours and often, I targ: -

As you can see, it proved rather obliging and its high-pitched call could be heard at times, taking me back to the flocks I saw in Canada last December here. It does have extensive black feathering in the inner primaries (to P3) - a feature potentially of a second-cycle (so third calendar year) bird; however its primary coverts and alula were unmarked so probably best to age it as an adult. Not much else about, and getting back to London with a couple of hours of light left produced little of note; just one NTGG ringed Herring Gull at Crayford. Grim weather forecast tomorrow but I'll still be getting amongst it - last day of British birding as I'm off to California next Saturday for some serious yank gullage.

one and a half Casps

I was on the tip on Saturday, rudely interrupted by news of that big brute of a finch. It didn't however dent my enjoyment of the gulls and after seeing a 2nd-winter Caspian Gull (the same bird that has been regular at Wat Tyler CP recently), the other Caspian-esque Gull was this individual, which I firmly believe comes from that hybrid swarm in/near Poland where cachinnans mixes with argentatus Herring Gulls. So for now I'm going to call this near adult (presumably 5cy) bird a hybrid.

Note the Caspian Gull like stance and structure, clean head, spindly tepid-coloured legs and slim parallel-sided bill. Chris Gibbins' landmark BB paper however states 'a clearly pale eye in a near-adult gull is not good for cachinnans but a dark eye does not automatically rule out Herring Gull'.

Nice remnant necklace. Note the Caspian Gull-like white tip to P10, also shared by argentatus Herring. The pale tongue on the underside of this feather looks atypically dark, while P9 is within range for Caspian Gull showing a banded white tip.

Note the extensive dark retained in the primary coverts. Although the grey tongues bleeding into the black on P7-P10 are obvious here, is there too much black in the wing or is this due to immaturity? Anyway, there is just a delicate and indistinct black line on P5 - too feint for a pure cachinnans?

Interestingly, to throw even more into the mix, a Polish-ringed bird that was seen as a first-winter several winters ago - where it looked like a decent 1st-winter Caspian Gull - was seen again on the tip as a near adult, where it looked decidedly like a Herring Gull. Interesting stuff, and it leaves one to wonder what all these 1st-winter Casps we see in Britain will actually mature into. The couple of adult Med Gulls whacking about were slightly easier to identify!

Pine Grosbeak on Shetland

It was predicted to happen last November, and it did despite not knowing it at the time. And though news trickled out rather belatedly and indirectly, there was thankfully still time to connect as this big bruiser of a finch had found North Mainland, Shetland to its liking. I'd previously dipped on Pine Grosbeak a couple of times in Britain (got as far as Inverness for a bird on Shetland in 2000 and spent time searching Easington in vain in 2004), and with the Herts/Essex bird quite rightly festering in the abyss, it was time to rectify things.

And so with news breaking mid morning on Saturday, the plan was eventually mapped out with scheduled flights on and off from Aberdeen on Sunday 3rd Feb. An overnight drive with Alan L and Simon K was properly efficient, with a load of snow in Lanarkshire the only thing slowing us down. And after meeting up with another 10 or so birders in the airport, the flight left on time, but the journey was bumpy to say the least. As we were coming down into Sumburgh, blown like a leaf, there was all of a sudden a real crackle/light when a bolt of lightning hit the left hand wing of the plane! S**t the bed, and with land in sight the poor air hostess came on the radio announcing that fact but, within just a couple of minutes, we'd thankfully landed at Sumburgh safely. Rather reminiscent of a similar grim incident at the same location, where I was in a plane where the undercarriage wouldn't come out... but again, it all ended happily.

Anyway, it was now late morning and with limited light, the drive across a windy Shetland was done at breakneck speed. Arriving by the small pine-filled garden overlooking the pier at North Collafirth, the Pine Grosbeak, probably a 1st-winter male, was immediately on show munching away on the abundant food source. Twitching's not everyone's cup of tea - especially when extreme travelling distances like this are involved - but this was a proper decent bird. A real one for all the punters, and despite having seen them in Finland previously, it really didn't matter as it was such a quality bird. A real shower too, at one point coming down to drink beside the crowd. It fed typically lethargically, just chewing away and on a couple of occasions flew in undulating fashion between the pines.

The last hour of daylight was spent at Scalloway where a juvenile Iceland Gull showed fine in the harbour there, while the usual chippy in Lerwick was visited before we flew out of Sumburgh mid evening. After a gruelling overnight drive back from Aberdeen, I arrived back in London just in time for school. Happy days!

Pine Grosbeak twitch, North Collafirth, Shetland Feb 2013

Bird-filled London town

London isn't that bad for birding, really. I know that I waffle on about it being the birding abyss, having grown up in rural Cheshire, but today was time to disprove that statement. And in the sunshine too as it turned out.

1st-winter Kittiwake, Crossness 27 Jan 2013

Crossness has been severely underwatched in the last couple of weeks, what with John A in India and Kev J back at Crayford despite the Aleppo-style gun battles. So I decided to get back on it, and it wasn't long before I was in on the action with a nice, though rather lethargic 1st-winter Kittiwake off the golf centre. Normally Kittiwakes on the Thames move straight through, but this youth decided to stay put for all my visit. Loads of other birds in the blustery conditions including a Grey Plover, 3 Yellow-legged Gulls and a couple of hundred Dunlin.

Slavonian Grebe, Littlebrook 27 Jan 2013

Nearby, I had another look at the confiding Slavonian Grebe at Littlebrook in much better light conditions and minus the snow. Good to bump into Kit D, Mick S, James L and Jonathan L amongst others, who were all snapping away with their long lenses. So knowing that my shots would be rather meagre in comparison, I headed back into Central London and to Hyde Park with the warning from Jonathan L that 'you're going to kill somebody this afternoon Rich'.

Bearded Tits, Hyde Park 27 Jan 2013

I didn't by the way. Despite my admittedly short fuse when it comes to the general public, for some reason I didn't get too many questions while I was watching the celebrity Bearded Tits and it was a relatively pleasurable experience in nice, bright sunlight - though those darn reeds were blowing about a bit too much for my liking. 48 Egyptian Geese chilling out by The Lido were good value too.

And to yesterday, with just a couple of spare hours before I had to venture indoors for the remainder of the day - a 2nd-winter Yellow-legged Gull on the beach at Rotherhithe and a couple of friendly Egyptian Geese greeted me as I walked out of my flat.

Messy eater in Rotherhithe 26 Jan 2013

Snowbirding

I awoke, and it was already snowing. Even so I decided to venture out to Dartford as a really showy Slavonian Grebe had been found at Littlebrook. Well, all I can say is that it was the most obliging Slav I've ever seen and despite the snow, I managed some reasonable images.

 

 

With the snow getting heavier and Karen wanting to be picked up, Rotherhithe was calling. And so I hit the beach, where there were a load of larids loafing. And amongst them was my first Yellow-legged Gull in Rotherhithe for 2013, a nice enough, fairly advanced 3rd-winter bird looking pretty p*ssed off with life in the snow.

Otherwise, I just chilled out and had a nice walk through all my regular haunts listening and looking out for stuff, but quite a bit of the passerines seemed to have vacated the area bar a handful of Redwings, while parakeets were squawking about a bit more than usual. Here are a few Rotherhithe snow scenes: - 

Cold weather produces two Ruff

I had one of those bizarrely intellectual moments as I typed the title of this post. What is the plural of Ruff - Ruff or Ruffs? I've always dropped the 's' and haven't managed to find any definitive contradiction, so I'll stay with what I know.

Two Ruff and one Lapwing, Deptford Creek 19th Jan 2013

So here goes it. Early afternoon and I check one of my regular, usually birdless, spots at Glaisher Street, that overlooks a small channel 'Deptford Creek' that flows into the Thames a few hundred metres upriver of The Cutty Sark, Greenwich. Chuck some bread out and while the larids swarm me, four waders fly to the foreshore out of nowhere. Two Ruff and two Lapwing - the latter decent anywhere in Central London whereas the two Ruff are mega, my first ever here. The tide quickly pushed all the birds off the area with the Ruff heading north over the Isle of Dogs and the Lapwings heading west along the river over Rotherhithe.

Odd wader habitat but I guess that's what cold weather does to birds...

Prior to that I'd checked all the water bodies in Rotherhithe/Burgess Park from early on, with little success bar an increase in Tufted Ducks. The cheap bread I always have in my car didn't attract any interesting larids, and the 39 Waxwings trilling right over me by the Holiday Inn, Dartford would have made lovely shots if it wasn't the worst day for light you could imagine. An adult Yellow-legged Gull and a couple of ringed gulls nearby, and that was the score for today. Not bad as this was a bonus birding day, as my Saturday intervention class for my kids was cancelled due to the poor weather. More snow tomorrow apparently.

Brown-headed Gulls age by age

While in Thailand a couple of weeks ago, I managed a couple of hours at Bang Poo where there were excellent photographic opportunities to get amongst large numbers of Brown-headed Gulls. It's just shy of an hour from Bangkok in decent traffic, and the Thais have turned feeding gulls into a much loved past time - so much so, there are stalls that line the pier that offer gull food that the locals then purchase and lob out for all the brunnicephalus.

larid loving Thais at Bang Poo

So, what do Brown-headed Gulls look like overall? Marginally larger and sturdier, longer-legged and slightly heavier billed than Black-headed Gulls. Adults are obvious, first-winters not so much and also interesting to see some evidence of presumed second-winter birds. Loads of individual structural differences too. I managed to pick out a couple of first-winter Black-headed Gulls in amongst them, which were decent enough in flight but then blended in much more when on the deck. So here goes with the details - all photos taken on 23rd December 2012 at Bang Poo.

Adults
Piercing, pale irises and large white round mirrors to the two outer primaries - primary coverts and bases to the primaries crisp white, contrasting nicely with mid grey on the rest of the upperwing. Quite handsome really, at least when they're not something you see everyday.

 

 

 

This bird shows a small mirror to P8, apparently present in 10% of adults (black otherwise)

Inbetweeners
These birds are presumably second-winter birds, and from the knowledge I've gained ringing Black-headed Gulls, usual sub-adult plumage traits such as dark-centred primary coverts also apply to Brown-headed Gull. Here are a some examples.

Obvious dark smudge on primary coverts suggestive of a sub-adult bird

 

Retained dark secondaries and restricted mirrors in P9 and P10 (with the latter growing) - bird showing atypically late moult

First-winters
If you had a lone small (presumably female) bird that just wouldn't flap its wings, then you'd want to see more. You'll see that there is proper structural difference between individuals - some almost Med Gull bill girth, with others much more slight like Black-headed Gull. In fact the smallest Brown-headed Gull is just a couple of cm larger than the largest Black-headed Gull, so although some heavy-billed large Brown-headed Gulls are so different, if you're unlucky then you could have slight issues - though not too sure whether the WP record really stands up to modern day larid scrutiny. In flight, however, they're quite obvious with solid dark inner as well as outer webs to the outer primaries and the white primary bases creating that wing flash seen in adults.

A large, advanced 1st-winter

A more meak looking individual

 

Quite a sturdy-looking, thick-billed bird

Note the contrasting white upperwing coverts with solid black on both webs of the outer primaries

And just for good measure, here is a first-winter Black-headed Gull that was in amongst the Brown-headed Gulls - its small size was evident (to an extent it was like picking out a Bonaparte's Gull from Black-headed Gulls here in the UK - more buoyant flight) as well as the obvious pale centres to the outer primaries.



1st-winter Black-headed Gull, Bang Poo 23rd Dec 2012