04 September 2011

Colour-ringed Mediterranean Gulls

Of 29 Med Gulls seen in Bracelet Bay this lunchtime, 3 were colour-ringed birds. We know the origins of two of them; Red YHE8 is a Serbian breeder and White 3K80 hails from Belgium, where it was hatched in 2006. Green 3T9 is a new bird, for me at least, obviously ringed in 2011, but difficult to determine where using the Euring website, but I should find out shortly. In addition to the Bracelet Bay birds we also saw 26 at Blackpill and a few others dotted around the Mumbles area. There was also colour-ringed Herring Gull marked with orange letters BBX on a blue ring, most probably a Gloucester landfill bird?

A good tip for anyone not sure how to tell a Mediterranean Gull from similar species is to check the wing-tips: If they are all white then chances are you are looking at an adult Med. Gull, but note that younger birds have dark wing tips, as shown in the top example here.

4 comments:

Barry Stewart said...

Green 3T9 was ringed as a pullus on 18/06/2011 at Barbâtre, Polder de Sebastopol, Vendée, FRANCE and yesterdays sighting was the first resighting. Thanks as always to Camille Duponcheel for the rapid feedback.

Barry Stewart said...

I've also had feedback from Peter Stewart regarding the Herring Gull (Blue BBX), which as suspected was ringed at Gloucester landfill site as a 1st winter bird on 16/12/06. The life history report shows that I actually reported this bird from Bracelet Bay in 2009, this being the only site it's been noted at other the the tip.

Dave Sawyer said...

Got a good pic of med gull YHE8 at bracelet bay 22 Aug 2012

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