150 Guernsey Gulls Not Out!

Yesterday Antonio Gutierrez informed me that he had just seen his 150th different "Guernsey" colour ringed Lesser Black-backed Gull - Black 8AS4 a chick ringed on Burhou, Alderney in July this year. This is a truly incredible contribution from a single observer to our gull projects based in Guernsey, but of course Antonio has been making a major contribution to gull researching projects all over Europe for many years!
Antonio saw his first Guernsey gull - White 7S6 at Pantín Beach, Valdovino, A Coruna, Spain on 21st August 2008. His annual totals of Guernsey LBBGs have been as follows:-  2008 (two); 2009 (15); 2010 (30); 2011 (58) and 2012 (45 so far).
Gull researchers all over Europe are indebted to Antonio, and the growing number of gull enthusiasts in Western Europe , who take the time and trouble to look for, and to report (often with photographs)  colour ringed gulls. Below are a few of the "Guernsey Gulls" seen by Antonio in NW Spain!

 

Caspian Gull in Guernsey - Well in part maybe?!

Details have now been received for the colour-ringed 1st winter Caspian-type gull seen at L'Eree Beach , Guernsey on 7th September 2012. Green XCDP was ringed at Oberspreewald-Lausitz, Brandenburg, GERMANY on 30 May 2012. However, it was ringed in a mixed colony of argentatus/cachinaans/michahellis and unsurprisingly the exact parentage of the gull is not known. While some characteristics of the gull looked very good for Caspian Gull, other features were rather less clear. The bird will, at least for the time being, have to be recorded as a Caspian Gull/Hybrid. Perhaps, if this gull survives into adulthood, subsequent plumages may enable a more definite identification? This is an amazing record though, with the gull having flown some 1,200 km to reach Guernsey from its natal colony close to the Polish border!

 The Flight of Caspian Gull/hybrid Green XCDP

Caspian Gull/hybrid Green XCDP L'Eree Beach, Guernsey 07 September 2012 - PKV

Norwegian GBBG and French Herring Gull

An hour at Chouet landfill yesterday morning gave c 100 Herring Gull cr reads - all local birds except Light Blue B44H, a bird ringed in Seine-Maritime, France by Christine Blaize. On the beach afterwards one of the few GBBGs was a 1st year bird ringed in Vest-Agder, SW Norway (Black JP179).

 Chouet Landfill

Herring Gull Light Blue B44H



Colour Ringed Little Egret

Tony Loaring recently photographed a Little Egret with colour rings N4 at Fort Le Crocq. This bird is part of a Guernsey-based project run by Jamie Hooper. It was the only chick ringed on the first visit to the colony this season!

Little Egret N4

Guernsey Gulls Every Day in Portugal!

Guernsey colour-ringed Lesser Black-backed Gulls were seen on every day of my recent trip to the Algarve, Portugal! In total I made 33 observations of 21 different Guernsey birds - making the trip extremely successful. Based for nine days at Ferragudo, near Portimao in the Algarve, I managed to record gulls each morning and late afternoon mainly at three sites - Portimao Fish Port, Porto do Lagos Landfill and Quarteira Beach.
191 observations of 142 different colour-ringed LBBGs were made with birds from Scotland (four), England (24), Wales (six), Guernsey (21), Iceland (one), Germany (seven), Norway (11), Denmark (five), The Netherlands (33), Belgium (16), France (eight), Spain (two) and Portugal (four).
19 different Yellow-legged Gulls were also recorded as follows:- Algeria (one), Spain (five) and Portugal (13). Two Audouin's Gulls were from Corsica and Spain, while the nine White Storks recorded were from Portugal (seven), France (one) and Germany(one). The origins of a Greater Flamingo and Pied Avocet have yet to be traced.
The weather was absolutely superb - wall to wall sunshine and very warm - it was the summer we never got in Guernsey this year! . It was very nice to meet up with local ornithologist Carlos Pacheco (who regularly finds Guernsey Gulls in Portugal) and also Michael Davis (who reported some of my very first LBBGs from Quarteira...and has done so every year since 2009!). All in all a most relaxing and highly successful trip.

 Portimao Fishing Port

 Porto do Lagos Landfill

 Quarteira Fishing Port

 Gulls on Quarteira Beach

 Carlos Pacheco and PKV - Ferragudo

LBBGs from all over Western Europe!

German Spoonbills, Norwegian and French GBBGs and Belgian LBBG

A couple of Eurasian Spoonbills have been in Guernsey for the past few days. Thanks to the excellent photos by Tony Loaring we now have details of both birds. The one with the colour rings was ringed as a nestling on the German Wadden Sea island of Mellum on 30 May 2012. It then moved 25 km to Eckwardersiel near Wilhelmshaven on the mainland on 11 August where it was seen with the black-ringed individual on 24 August. The black-ringed bird was ringed there as a nestling, also on 30 May 2012, by the same ringers! There have been no further records of them since 24 August until they both turned up in Guernsey on 7 October 2012. 

Spoonbills at Fort Le Crocq 07 October 2012 (c) Tony Loaring

The Guernsey Gulls Blog has been quiet for nearly two weeks because I have been in southern Portugal in search of colour-ringed Lesser Black-backed Gulls - especially those ringed in the Bailiwick of Guernsey. I will make some separate postings regarding the success of this trip.

Today I made my first run down Guernsey's west coast to see what has happened to the LBBG and GBBG flocks along the coast. I was surprised to find c 300 LBBGs - including 11 of our locally colour-ringed birds. At least one third of the gulls could not be checked. Amongst the flock on Vazon Beach was a 2nd year Blue TZ.AY - ringed in Belgium. 

GBBGs were not numerous - perhaps 120 birds, but the flock included my first Norwegian-ringed bird of the autumn - Black JA612 (ringed as a chick in Vest-Agder in 2008, and seen in several previous autumns in Guernsey!). There were also three French-ringed GBBGs (two Chausey and one from Le Havre).