Real experts have provided plenty of detail (see links below) about some rare gulls that appeared along the Connecticut shore in March of 2016. I'm not one of them (expert or rare gull), but I did once write a song for the Cuckoos (THE birding band) that included the lines
"My friends don't understand what sport is this.
What kind of fool, what kind of chump,
Would drive all night and half the day to see,
Some seagulls at a city dump?" ("Ornitheology", ©C.S. Wood 1988)
So I am clearly qualified to discuss gulls.
Well, Hammonasset State Park in Madison is hardly a dump (despite what Mark Szantyr would have you believe) but it can be damn cold in a stiff southwesterly wind in March, and yet many birders recently spent many hours in that wind over several days seeking, finding, watching, and photographing a first State record California Gull, as well as a couple of Mew Gulls, less rare but only slightly.
Gulls are hard. They have lots of plumage stages, most of which are slightly varying shades of brown and gray. Distinguishing characteristics are often things like "broader white crescents on the folded wings" as compared, I guess, to "narrower white crescents on the folded wing."
Or "extensive smudging on the head" as compared to "some smudging on the head."
Iris color, leg color (both varying depending on age), darkness of gray mantle on adult birds ("pale," "dark," "darker"); these are the field marks that jump right out at you as your eyes blur in the cold 25 mph wind.
I'm going to use the California Gull as a demonstration of how easy it is to pull a rare gull out of a flock of thousands. It's not and, seriously, kudos to Stefan Martin for doing so in this case, and to the serious Laridophiles that specialize in challenges like finding one of the three sub-species of a gull that has not been documented previously at any given location.
So let's practice. Here is a California Gull in front of a Herring Gull. It's a little smaller.
Both are first cycle birds, meaning they were hatched last year, and both are, notably, brown. But on close inspection, there actually are characteristics that can lead to accurate identification. This, for the less sharp-eyed of us, is where photography comes in. By shooting 250 or so pics (modern technology - way cool) we can go back and really see those field marks we tried to see in the field.
Marks like the pattern of brown on the upper wings (all dark primaries, versus pale base of primaries 1-8 on a Herring Gull), clearly evident here in freeze-frame but clearly not evident in real time.
(Both pictures, California Gull on left, Herring Gull on right)
Plus the bill is pale with a dark tip, not yellow with a banded tip like the Ring-billed Gull.
Leg color is another field mark: bluish gray on the California vs yellowish gray on the Ring-billed Gull (above) and pinkish gray on this Herring Gull (below), which also shows the heavier and all dark bill of a first year Herring Gull.
Now, next year they will be slightly less brown, and the year after that even less brown and more white and gray, until after three years as gulls they are no longer indistinguishable due to brownness, but now indistinguishable due to gray- and whiteness.
So, how do you identify a rare gull? My best birding advice is to stand next to a real gull expert like Stefan Martin, Nick Bonomo (http://www.shorebirder.com), or Julian Hough (https://naturescapeimages.wordpress.com).
Whoops, there he goes.
"My friends don't understand what sport is this.
What kind of fool, what kind of chump,
Would drive all night and half the day to see,
Some seagulls at a city dump?" ("Ornitheology", ©C.S. Wood 1988)
So I am clearly qualified to discuss gulls.
Well, Hammonasset State Park in Madison is hardly a dump (despite what Mark Szantyr would have you believe) but it can be damn cold in a stiff southwesterly wind in March, and yet many birders recently spent many hours in that wind over several days seeking, finding, watching, and photographing a first State record California Gull, as well as a couple of Mew Gulls, less rare but only slightly.
Gulls are hard. They have lots of plumage stages, most of which are slightly varying shades of brown and gray. Distinguishing characteristics are often things like "broader white crescents on the folded wings" as compared, I guess, to "narrower white crescents on the folded wing."
Or "extensive smudging on the head" as compared to "some smudging on the head."
Iris color, leg color (both varying depending on age), darkness of gray mantle on adult birds ("pale," "dark," "darker"); these are the field marks that jump right out at you as your eyes blur in the cold 25 mph wind.
I'm going to use the California Gull as a demonstration of how easy it is to pull a rare gull out of a flock of thousands. It's not and, seriously, kudos to Stefan Martin for doing so in this case, and to the serious Laridophiles that specialize in challenges like finding one of the three sub-species of a gull that has not been documented previously at any given location.
So let's practice. Here is a California Gull in front of a Herring Gull. It's a little smaller.
Both are first cycle birds, meaning they were hatched last year, and both are, notably, brown. But on close inspection, there actually are characteristics that can lead to accurate identification. This, for the less sharp-eyed of us, is where photography comes in. By shooting 250 or so pics (modern technology - way cool) we can go back and really see those field marks we tried to see in the field.
Marks like the pattern of brown on the upper wings (all dark primaries, versus pale base of primaries 1-8 on a Herring Gull), clearly evident here in freeze-frame but clearly not evident in real time.
And the bill shape: narrow bill with nearly parallel top and bottom edge, versus bulgy bill with rounded culmen (top end of the bill) of the Herring Gull.
Plus the bill is pale with a dark tip, not yellow with a banded tip like the Ring-billed Gull.
Leg color is another field mark: bluish gray on the California vs yellowish gray on the Ring-billed Gull (above) and pinkish gray on this Herring Gull (below), which also shows the heavier and all dark bill of a first year Herring Gull.
Now, next year they will be slightly less brown, and the year after that even less brown and more white and gray, until after three years as gulls they are no longer indistinguishable due to brownness, but now indistinguishable due to gray- and whiteness.
So, how do you identify a rare gull? My best birding advice is to stand next to a real gull expert like Stefan Martin, Nick Bonomo (http://www.shorebirder.com), or Julian Hough (https://naturescapeimages.wordpress.com).
Whoops, there he goes.
All photos ©C.S. Wood 2016
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