2CY American Herring Gulls

They might not be pretty but I was hoping to see more of these brutes than I managed. Here are the two 2CY individuals that came into photographic range. The flying bird was offshore and the other was on Marconi Beach, MA, in July.

Edit: found another pic of a different, but very similarly plumaged bird (right), also offshore.

Also here are some very heavily cropped pics of another 2CY American Herring Gull showing off its dark tail feathers.

Royal icing

I could not resist another lunchtime trip to the royal park of Holyrood. Once again the Iceland Gull was up at Dunsapie and performing well. It was struggling against the competitors but at one point I see that it managed a small morsel of bread.

Interestingly it started calling at one point - like a typical Herring Gull begging call but higher pitched and thinner, certainly lacking in the harsh elements of typical large gull calls. Then I realised that the bird did appear to be begging - it had adopted a low hunched posture with upturned bill and was steadily pursuing a Herring Gull. 

While this hunched posture is used by young gulls as a submissive appeasement behaviour, it is also part of the food begging repertoire of most species - it certainly looked like begging. A good idea perhaps, but it didn't do the trick - the sub-adult Herring Gull (maybe confused by the appearance of an instant offspring) vacated the area.

What a great bird - here are a few more shots...