Saturday 12 March 2011

Mandarin and a hybrid gull ?


A pair of mandarins from Tuesday at Santon Downham showing very nicely. They were however very alert and wary of me to the extent that the male was doing some kind of threat gesture towards me, something I have not seen before.



The gull is probably either a hybrid Med x Blackhead or a leucistic Black headed gull, I'm not too sure but I think the hybrid theory may be more likely, any thoughts?






3 comments:

  1. never seen that Mandarin behaviour - even at some pretty busy London sites. And that is a tricky gull. I'd plump for leucistic BHG due to structure, but it's not a simple one for sure. The rear tertials are a bit funny though...

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  2. The Gull does seem to be tricky to sus out. I think I'll see what birdforum makes of it.

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  3. Birdforum came up with leucistic BH gull too, so I guess that'll be it then

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