Some immature Yellow-legged Gulls, Bucharest, November 28th

[Cristian Mihai]

In the first three pics a nice 2cy bird.
In the next three pics another bird.

[lou bertalan]

hi cristian,

the 'other' bird is a 2cy caspian. note the growing pale tongues on p10 underside (and p8,9), i think its bill is a bit deformed (upper mandible) thus the monstrous appearance. it is short also for caspian. but on plumage alone this looks like a good cachi.

cristian, my proposal is to further post pics from dambovita here: viewtopic.php?f=11&t=57
that would be enbedded in a much clearer thread about that specific location - and you wouldn't be bothered with posting pics of either caspian, YLG or other species in the same post.

best,

[Cristian Mihai]

Thankx Lou,

Obviously I have to agree with you that the second bird looks much better for a Caspian

[Theo Muusse]

The first one, if seen at least in Holland and around, would ask for a careful elimination of Herring!
Theo

[JanJ]

The first one, if seen at least in Holland and around, would ask for a careful elimination of Herring!
Theo

Around here to, that is to say SE. Sweden

JanJ

[Jonas Landolt]

Hi everybody

I'm from Switzerland. And here I have exactly this problem with second winter Herring and Yellow-legged Gulls, because in winter Herring Gulls are nearly as common as Ylg at the Bodensee. What are the best features to identify second winter Herring respectively Yellow-legged Gulls? In the "Gulls of Europe,..." from Olson and Larsson are mentioned points like: vermiculated greater coverts or with indistinct bars, saddle with a mixture of grey and dark-marked feathers etc. This Ylg from Bucharest shows exactly these features... In the book aren't many helpful identification points and there is no comparison of second winter birds. What does a typical second winter Hg/Ylg look like? Unfortunately on the web I couldn't find many pictures of second winter gulls. Are there any papers about this topic?

Good Gulling
Jonas

[JanJ]

Hello Jonas.

A quick answer to your question would be to direct you to this very site, which might be a better option than explaning with a lot of words, I´m sure you have noticed.
For a start - have a look at these and note as well as plumage (variability included) structural and moult differences.

http://www.gull-research.org/ylg1cy2cy/ ... cyjuly.htm

http://www.gull-research.org/hg/HG1CY07.htm

http://www.iesmeulmeester.nl/index.php

http://www.pbase.com/stephaubry/gulls&page=all

http://www.xs4all.nl/~daarruud/

JanJ

[adriaens]

Hi Jonas,

I think the key is to study difficult birds like this not only at rest but also in flight.
For a few general identification tips, see e.g. http://www.gull-research.org/papers/thesis.pdf , page 63.

[Cristian Mihai]

I found again (after 33 days) the first bird from this topic. The new location is at a few kilometers from the old one. Some pics attached here.