Just a rerun of the last 2 days with -4 degrees at Ogden on a cold SE>4 increasing to SE>5 remaining cloudy until mid morning. Bitter cold at Mixenden with a biting wind and light snow showers.
Three Canadas on the water at Ogden and around 150 small gulls along with 2 2nd winter Herring gulls. The Kingfisher was down in the sluice gate and just a few Tit species around the reservoir track.
Mixenden again failed to provide with around 120 small gulls and 13 Canadas which were new in. What a struggle this has been over the last few days.
One point of interest today was a quick return of info on the Ogden Common gull with the white leg ring. The bird was rung 30/6/2019 at Bergen, Hordaland, Norway and has not been seen since, until I located it at Ogden. The gull is reported as being 867 miles from the place it was rung. Thats a long way to turn up and the reservoir is frozen !
The second point of interest is, I,m suddenly turning up several Black Headed gulls with a full or partial jet black hood making me look twice for Med gull when at a distance. The black hood really makes the C shaped eye crescent stand out, even at distance.
So far I,ve found nothing in the literature about this but my thoughts were, are these birds moving through from a different region or have they already gone through the moult into summer plumage and the new hood colour gets more chocolate brown with fading. Black Headeds usually start to get summer plumage at the end of February. Its something I have,nt noticed before.
Luckily I know a couple of gull men that will be able to explain this, says he, hopefully.
BS