More gulls

Gull

Mystery gull

On Monday, down at the small river behind the place I work, I saw a lot of gulls like the ones I usually see. But I also saw another type of gull, standing alone on a rock.


This gull was a lot larger than the usual ones, and I cannot identify it. Is it a Vega Gull (Larus vegae)? A Mongolian Gull (Larus mongolicus)?

The gulls I usually see are easy to identify. They are, of course, Larus Ridiculous, which is probably why the mystery gull did not want to hang out with them.

Not polite

Today we had gorgeous May weather (yes, I know it's March, but the weather was May), so I cycled down to the big river. There I discovered a very good reason to wear a hat.


I also discovered a very good reason to wrap a plastic bag over your bicycle seat.


(See how I cleverly focused on the grass instead of on the man or the gulls? I have a bruise on my forehead from when I noticed that after uploading the photos to my computer.)

I had brought food too, but my food was for the ducks. I cycled further down the river to find some. When I did, and threw food to them, the gulls spotted me.

Poor ducks. They know when there's no point in competing. The gulls were catching the food before it hit the water, and if a duck was in the way it got divebombed, so they left. Quickly. They paddled like mad. They could not get away fast enough.


I soon discovered that taking photos of gulls while I was feeding them myself was very, very difficult, because I also got divebombed. At one point I was trying to hold up the camera with one hand and had some bread in the other, and suddenly the food was snatched away. Another gull then made a close pass, and apparently annoyed that the food was gone, shat on my hand and screamed. The ingratitude!

Gulls are not polite creatures, and are positively ruthless when it comes to food. This is the only shot I got when I was feeding them. I think I'll let other people do the feeding next time.


When I told the gulls the food was finished they didn't believe it, and hung around for a while keeping a keen eye on me just to make sure. That was the only time I could get decent pictures. They aren't as interesting as the feeding ones would have been if I'd been able to take them, but still, I'm quite fond of that last one.