Yellow-legged Gull (lusitanius)?

[binocularface]

Hi,

I recently photographed the gull in the attached images in Dumfries & Galloway (Scotland). To my relatively inexperienced eye the overall structure, bill pattern, gape & orbital ring colouration and primary pattern all fit Yellow-legged Gull pretty well. However this bird seems paler mantled that I would usually expect in michahelis, the leg colouration is more of a washed out yellow in tone and the bird is quite small. Does this bird fit lusitanius or is there some hybrid influence?

Advice greatly appreciated.

Regards
Tristan

Yellow-legged-Gull---Bishop-Burn-(2).jpg (88.15KiB)Viewed 7217 times

Yellow-legged-Gull---Bishop-Burn-(13).jpg (80.14KiB)Viewed 7217 times

Yellow-legged-Gull---Bishop-Burn-(12).jpg (103.65KiB)Viewed 7217 times

Yellow-legged-Gull---Bishop-Burn-(5).jpg (93.89KiB)Viewed 7217 times

Yellow-legged-Gull---Bishop-Burn-(4).jpg (92.93KiB)Viewed 7217 times

[Cristian Mihai]

If I would see such a bird in Romania, I would identify it as a female Yellow-legged Gull. But this is a bird from UK...

[Cristian Mihai]

Some interesting comments/opinions here:
http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=195513

[binocularface]

Thanks Cristian - It seems this bird may be unidentifiable! The term 'lusitanius' appears to be a bit frightening

[Cristian Mihai]

Yep, probably this is one of the reasons we like the gulls - sometimes we don't know what they really are!