A teatime session at Leeshaw in dull and damp conditions proved interesting with skies alive with birds. The main target bird was Osprey as well as Little Ringed Plover, and Cuckoo, non of which transpired but a decent watch all the same. All the usual species were present, many guarding their territory whilst a Buzzard nearly got past me as I was photographing Oystercatchers.
Surprising to see a few gulls present with 3 Black Headed and 4 Lesser Black Backed which brings me on to todays problem sighting.
Whilst up by Bodkin farm I looked down at the dam wall to see what looked like a LBB and a GBB gull side by side going by the size of them though the large bird didnt look dark enough plus the wrong time of year for Great Black Backed.
A dash down the hill to get a closer look found 2 gulls in LBB uniform but one much larger in every way than the other. GBB was quickly ruled out due to light wing colour and leg colour yet the wing colour was too dark for Yellow Legged Herring gull, so why the size difference ? I even went around the other side to see if it was an optical illusion but the result was the same.
I ll have to do a bit of looking up on this one unless my gull back up team get back to me first.
58 Greylag
123 Canada
1Buzzard
2 Kestrel
3 Oystercatchers
4 Redshank
1 Cormorant
4 LBB gull
3 BHG gull
4 Curlew
2 Snipe
sev Lapwings and Mipits.
+ usual sp.
BS