Belated YLG

A mainly dry day with just the odd very light shower. A west(ish) wind

Thanks to Pete Crooks who spotted that one of the gulls on Wednesday's post looked to be a 3rd calendar year Yellow-Legged Gull. Discussions and further checks proved him to be correct

This is the shot from Wednesday's post. YLG on the right

Common Gull and Yellow-Legged Gull

Heysham skear - Malcolm 09:30 - 11:00

Gulls c500 mainly Herring gulls

Two green ringed birds were seen, but both seen here previously this summer.
This is one of the Herring Gulls ringed as a chick on the Power Station last year.

One of the clues to the Yellow-Legged gull was its pale mantle (compared to a Lesser Black-backed). But judging the colour of gulls is notoriously difficult. The colouration isn't just pigment but how the feathers reflect/scatter sunlight, a dark plumaged gull can look pale in bright sunshine. Legs too can be deceptive, not all are obviously pink and yellow. This is partly down to natural variation and also there is some hybridisation.

This is a classic adult Lesser Black-backed gull.
A dark slate back and bright yellow legs

This gull was ringed as a Herring gull and its mother almost certainly was.
But its mantle is quite dark and its legs somewhere between pink and yellow

This one looks like a Herring gull, but its legs suggest yellow not pink

Enough to make your head spin when you have 500 to check, and soon there will likely be many more.

The seed mussels are spreading and growing, these are 100m before conger rock. They will be larger and denser further out.

This shows the size of the seed mussels, based on the British Standard 
mussel measure, a £1 coin

They are now carpeting the whole surface here

Eider just 1 male

Little Egret 6

Little Egret

Oystercatcher c800

Curlew 1

Knot 3

Sanderling 1 

Knot

Sanderling

The local facebook reported a dead Gannet along the strandline at Half Moon Bay. Not surprising really as the resent onshore strong winds have littered the shore with anything that was floating.

Fortunately, it was all natural "litter"

The gulls and Oystercatchers were turning over the broken weed to see
what lurked underneath