gulls (6 Viewers)

[Cristian Mihai]

Some pics taken on December 2nd in Bucharest.

 

[lou salomon]

asymmetric moult

watch this caspian with pretty advanced covert and tertial moult - with 2nd gen. tertials on left side only:

http://i.pbase.com/o3/09/645509/1/104965013.Y2lMeNd3.DSC09156.jpg
http://k53.pbase.com/o2/09/645509/1/104858950.s2dQrggT.DSC09164.jpg

 

[Cristian Mihai]

The first link doesn't work for me:

"Forbidden

You don't have permission to access /o3/09/645509/1/104965013.Y2lMeNd3.DSC09156.jpg on this server.
Apache/2.0.58 (Unix) Server at i.pbase.com Port 80"

 

[lou salomon]

strange enough it didn't work on the pc at work for me either, now at home it still works. but you can access stephane's website and click on 'new pics' or follow this link: http://www.pbase.com/stephaubry/news&page=2 - in the third pic you see the left side of the bird with the new tertials (wide pale fringes). thank you for the new herastrau pics, cristian, i'm gonna work them through right now.

 

[Howard King]

Bahrain 5th Dec

Dull and overcast at times with rain threatening but never seeming to arrive. Saw these today sat on on one of the reclaimed areas and thought of you guys. The pics are taken from a distance as the Caspian Terns amongst them were a bit spooky and would put everything up on close approach.
Pic 4 is cropped from pic 5 (same bird) I messed up the setting on the flight shot so wing is out of focus.

 

[Howard King]

To add a few more central two pics of the bird stretching its wings are of the same individual

 

[lou salomon]

Some pics taken on December 2nd in Bucharest.

hi cristian!

a bit late but still i wanted to give you feedback about these from herastrau park (they are different ones from those 33 pics you sent me privately!, at least some of them)

1. on first view a cute female type younger michahellis. jizz - large head, pale iris, thick neck, elegant body. on a second look there are some things to consider. bill looks pretty pointed (not so much curved upper mandible at tip), bill coloration and dull legs suggest a younger age (4-5 cy type) but if one combines these with the large all white p10 tip (underwing, right wing) and pretty large, round mirror in p9 (dorsal, left wing), then suddenly the question arises if in fact this is not a cachinnans!? with an absolutely atypic head shape. i can't see a grey tonge on p10 (right wing) however. primary projection is relative long, which would be ok for female michahellis though. not so the large p9 mirror, especially if a younger adult/older subadult.

jan, pim, ies - what's your opinions? :smoke:

2. pretty classic michahellis primary pattern (but with all white p10 tip, rel. common in eastern birds)

3. could be the same bird on pp but strongly spread wing reveals a pretty long p9 tongue. however no visible p10 tongue. a 'good' michahellis.

4. and 5 have a very similar pattern although if one sees only head in pic4 (ok, not so sharp and prob. with bad light) it would give a pontic gull impression.

 

[Cristian Mihai]

Thankx for comments Lou. These pics were taken on Dambovita river (at the Eastern border of the city).

 

[Cristian Mihai]

What about these three pics taken in Herastrau (december 4th)?

 

[Ies Meulmeester]

hi cristian!
1. on first view a cute female type younger michahellis. jizz - large head, pale iris, thick neck, elegant body. on a second look there are some things to consider. bill looks pretty pointed (not so much curved upper mandible at tip), bill coloration and dull legs suggest a younger age (4-5 cy type) but if one combines these with the large all white p10 tip (underwing, right wing) and pretty large, round mirror in p9 (dorsal, left wing), then suddenly the question arises if in fact this is not a cachinnans!? with an absolutely atypic head shape. i can't see a grey tonge on p10 (right wing) however. primary projection is relative long, which would be ok for female michahellis though. not so the large p9 mirror, especially if a younger adult/older subadult.

jan, pim, ies - what's your opinions? :smoke:

I think it's a 4cy male cachinnans with a little bit paler iris than we are accustomed.

Good features are the small, slender and elegant build, long and slender bill without a large gonysangle and the coloration, the very long(tibia) fleshy colored legs, pure white head, breast and underparts with only a view dark spots in the hindneck, pale shade of gray of the upperparts, long primary projection and the pattern on p9 and p10.

In my opinion you will not (soon) see a combination of this features in sub-adult michahellis

 

[JANJ]

Cristians gulls in post 641 all looks like michahellis. Underwing primary pattern, with reduced black on p9 in 2, 4 & 5 - making pattern on underwing similar to some eastern cachinnans.

JanJ

Edit:

First gull looks better for cachinnans, although pale-eyed. The unpatterned head and bil shape with spots on the hindneck together with structure fits cachinnans better.

 

[JANJ]

Well - there Ies made the same suggestion I see.

JanJ

 

[lou salomon]

What about these three pics taken in Herastrau (december 4th)?

hi cristian,

well, i know them already. as far as i can see in pics 1-2 all are cachinnans. interesting 'broken' tongue on p10 of the first adult bird (pic 1). edit: it could be a younger adult (5cy?) due to the strong subterminal mark on p10 and not so long reaching tongue.

the other one looks like a 1cy michahellis underwing but who knows, there's a small bit of a lighter spot near the apex of the wing (p10). so not all cachis, but hard to say.
edit: tips of primaries look rounded indicating a 2cy, still probably yellow-legged with that surface of dark brown. in that case, hints of mirrors would say pontic but i think i have seen such very subtle light markings that you can't really call mirrors in 2nd generation p10 micha also - we don't know all the variation in the eastern YLG which resemble in many points to cachis..

very nice 4cy type pontic gull in pic 2 with spread wings already showing the pale tongues.
the starting bird to the right of pic 2 looks like a 1cy cachinanns as well, very pale underwing, long neck.

the open winged bird in pic 3 looks like a 3(-4?)cy michahellis.

 

[JANJ]

Howard.

Nice set of gulls you have there. Dark gulls heuglini image 2 flying, right in image 3 (with a cachinnans in the middle taking flight) and probably in 4 & 5, the last on moult score.
The next set seems to be all barabensis on structure (upperparts tone is not advisible to judge in these images), the one on the left in image 6 could be a heuglini as could the one in image 7 & 8 - moult score at this time of year in favour of heuglini.

JanJ

 

[lou salomon]

hello howard,

mysterious birds these gulf states winterers. some notes:

pic 1:
i still don't know how to separate 1st winter barabensis from 1st winter heuglini but i notice quite extensive pale inner webs up to p9(!), even more than i'd expect in a cachinnans. shouldn't heuglini have darker (inner) primaries, similar to fuscus? rest of birds look like barabensis, "habitually".

pic 2:
if that is an adult heuglini (flying bird) then it is hellish advanced in moult - almost fully grown p10. within variation of moult timing for heuglini? what a vivid pink in those feet!

pic 3: what a great shot. seems to show all 3 taxons starting f.l.t.r. with barabensis (?), then a very snouty cachinnans which is quite late in moult, much later than the birds from black sea and in this case later than the heuglini from pic 2 (inverse world!), then probably again barabensis (the small one facing front to us) and a very obvious (western) heuglini on the right, with its nice "painted" eyes, often seen in this taxon.

pic 4 & 5:
jan may be right with heuglini (latest moulter) but as seen above these things don't seem to work in some cases. pale iris and yellowish feet (could be a barabensis as well) - and again these pinkish feet.

pic 6:
the 3 larger birds heuglini?, the 2 smaller ones barabensis? that's how it looks to me. left bird a 2cy, same for the right hand presumed barabensis.

pic 7:
a heuglini trio?, again with "eyelid lines". maybe they're barabensis?

pic 8: in this wider angle with more light they look mostly like barabensis (trio on the left is the same...), right hand adult looks pretty 'classic' barabensis, if there's such thing.

pic 9:
advanced moult favoures barabensis (fully grown p10 in the left bird, 2/3 in the right one)

pic 10:
all 4 look like barabensis to my eyes.

thanks for sharing them in this forum, howard. nice and instructive pics!

 

[lou salomon]

in comparison to howard's eastern caspian with more extended black in primaries, here a pic from cristian showing the western caspian (pontic) pattern. note the reduced black in wing tip, large mirror in p9 as well, very wide and long dorsal tongues (p9,10) and, again, a very weak subterminal p5-mark! (2.12. bucharest, herastrau park.)

plus the well known underwing pattern of 2nd generation 'ponticus' with a small p10 mirror, already visible tongues (shorter though than in older birds), delicately dark margined pale primary underwing coverts and an almost glaucous-like bill, similar to the recent madrid mystery bird.

 

[Howard King]

Lou , JanJ many thanks for your comments - I have to admit the more I watch the harder I find these Gulls, when I started it was easy just simply put them down as YL Gulls now that I am beginning to separate them more reliably I find I have so many more anomalies identified that I find I have confused myself.

 

[Cristian Mihai]

A pic taken today (december 9th)

 

[lou salomon]

hi all,

cristian just sent me pics of a 1cy from bucharest, today, which had me looking some time to see it as 1cy michahellis. a really dwarfy individual (maybe as small as the madrid gull but more compact in shape). the most striking thing is that it is very advanced in moult, having moulted not only almost all lesser and median but also the majority of greater coverts and tertials. even the 2(?) outer rectrices are 2nd generation. have a look.

 

[lou salomon]

and side by side with the apparantely 1cy pontic gull (which also has the looks of a female but is much larger)