A Rough Day for Counting

It's the Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS) weekend and my chosen day is Saturday for counting at Shawell. This is the better day to make sure I get the gulls.

The weather was dreadful today, even the gulls left early today. The wildfowl numbers are never anything to write home about, but it was good to see 13 Shoveler on the small gravel pit near to the entrance to the landfill site.

The gulls are viewable on the landfill site once again from Gibbet Lane although a little hedge trimming is required to make viewing more comfortable. From the road I spotted seven Yellow-legged Gulls including three first-winters.

Gulls were in short supply at the A5 Lagoons, but I did see the hybrid Caspian x Herring Gull that I saw last weekend and a fourth-winter Caspian Gull with better credentials.

Fourth-winter Caspian Gull

I sort of feel I've seen this Caspian Gull before. It would make sense that some of the Caspian Gulls are returning birds. This of course has been proven by the Polish ringed adult PADZ, which has been seen in Leicestershire two years in a row. This one sort of reminds me of a third-winter I saw last August (HERE). Its longest primary was new and still growing, so this gull will, like many others recently, will look even longer winged soon. 

Despite the diabolical weather this gull stood out with its clean features. It spent much of the time sandwiched between some adult Herring Gulls. The Herring Gulls were scruffy looking in their winter plumage compared to the Casp's white head and breast. The Caspian Gull sat much lower on the water and its head was noticeably smaller compared to the HG's.