Preparing for Pacific gulling

I'm excited. No, I haven't just signed up to Baggers' dancing birder thing on Sky One. But on Saturday morning, I'm heading off to California to get stuck into a load of tricky larids with a couple of other gull watching mates. Throw into the mix a load of good west coast birds and a week away from cold, grey London should give the old bones a bit of a shake out too.

This trip was hatched out of my semi-birding visit last summer, as well as trip reports from Steve A and info from Chris G. So the target is to come back knowing a bit more about what Thayer's Gulls actually look like in range, as well as shots of Glaucous-winged and Western Gulls (as well as the inbetweeners), Mew and Heermann's Gulls as well as west coast American Herring Gulls, all with full sets of wings!

1st-summer California Gull with quills for coverts

near-adult Glaucous-winged Gull mid-moult

presumably there's a Western Gull in there somewhere?

Some people have described Heermann's Gulls as beautiful. This one wasn't

These are of course extreme examples, but northern hemisphere gulls generally aren't at their best in the summer post-breeding months. So bring on this February trip.