A HARD DAY AT THE OFFICE : August 2009

Monday, August 17, 2009

Sandbanks Gulls

First decent headshot of an argenteus since I took a close up of a mich in the summer.

Yellowy orange eye ring here and a very pale yellow iris compared to the deep orange almost vermillion eye ring and grey yellow iris of the mich. Obviously this bird wont be so bright at this time of year but you get the general picture.

A birds eye view of the Sandbanks properties (and a tree)

You is ugly!

A mouth designed for gluttony

These were in that small period building at the junction of the road leading to Studland church

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Gull Bill

At least 2 intermedius on the Bill Common and this bird which was even darker. Even using the words Baltic Gull is met with derision these days so I wont mention that. Joking aside though is it really dainty enough? and although it has a long primary extension it isnt ridiculously long. It wouldnt be a classic fuscus but by definition not all are! This bird is probably a dark intermedius although it is very dark and the eye does look small!.....

The one in the middle is a standard graellsii which it makes look pretty pale. Mantle colour same as Geeb on left

...... Looking at its wings there doesnt seem to be a lot of moulting going on. Lots of ragged primaries here but there is something a bit odd . From the photo there is a white blob half way along the primaries on the left wing, it looks like a short primary indicating a half grown feather but it doesnt look like a newer darker feather. There is also a white blob on an apparently shorter primary on the other wing but again it looks the same colour as the others. The other thing of course is that it would have to be an odd bird that started its moult half way along its primaries, Im not even sure this can happen. Anyway I cant see any new feathers. The wing also looks pretty concolourous.

The fact that this bird appears not yet to have started its wing moult it puts it somewhere quite a way north but exactly where abouts up there it does not, unfortunately. The bummer is that as far as I am aware, moult can only be used to rule out birds from the Baltic at this time of the year and not the other way around. Was that a ring on its leg?!

Yellow-legged Gulls etc

Nice juv at the Bill car park, note it already has some 2nd generation scapulars being born that much earlier in the year

Juv HG (with bottle) for comparison.

All the scapulars are still juvenile

Big-eyed Wheatear in the Bill quarry. This bird I almost literally bumped into, it was still half asleep and couldnt be bothered to move giving point blank views. Took some quick shots but unfortunately the sun was directly in front. By the time I had tried to manouevre around the other side it flew off. Still a tiny bit of jiggery pokery on the computer gives half a decent shot.