Beauty Saunders's Gull Owen! And the signature crab in the mouth shot as well! Very nice.
Eurasian and Eastern Curlew can be difficult to separate sometimes but there's no question when they fly as you refer to.
Gull-billed Tern is a good score.
The Sand Plover photo is a Lesser. They can be difficult to tell apart and I mislabeled many before seeing my first Greater. The red and black borders can differ at different times of the year but Greaters have a huge bill. Most guides don't do a good job on this specie and can be misleading. The Birds of Thailand by Craig Robson does the best job on them I've seen. I am very interested on what you find there with Sand Plovers as my experience was that Greater tend to follow the mainland coast and not make the jump across through Laotieshan, much like Avocets as we discussed earlier. I only saw a handful of Greaters in southern Liaoning in habitat where there were many Lessers.
Absolutely love that Saunders's shot! You are privileged to live where you do and get to see them in full breeding plumage. What a striking gull.
Eurasian and Eastern Curlew can be difficult to separate sometimes but there's no question when they fly as you refer to.
Gull-billed Tern is a good score.
The Sand Plover photo is a Lesser. They can be difficult to tell apart and I mislabeled many before seeing my first Greater. The red and black borders can differ at different times of the year but Greaters have a huge bill. Most guides don't do a good job on this specie and can be misleading. The Birds of Thailand by Craig Robson does the best job on them I've seen. I am very interested on what you find there with Sand Plovers as my experience was that Greater tend to follow the mainland coast and not make the jump across through Laotieshan, much like Avocets as we discussed earlier. I only saw a handful of Greaters in southern Liaoning in habitat where there were many Lessers.
Absolutely love that Saunders's shot! You are privileged to live where you do and get to see them in full breeding plumage. What a striking gull.