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Topic: Herring gulls 銀鷗 (Read 409 times) |
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Hendrix
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Herring gulls 銀鷗
« on: Apr 16th, 2005, 12:17am » |
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Vega  yellow leg or same
D2X , AFS600/4 +1.4x , f7.1, 1/1250s, ISO 400
Mai Po Nature Reserve, Hong Kong 米埔
29/03/2005
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JanJ
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Re: Herring gulls 銀鷗
« Reply #1 on: Dec 23rd, 2005, 8:26am » |
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Hi Hendrix!
Difficult area, identification tentative, but the first one looks like a so called
vegae x taimyrensis. Lightly streaked only in the neck region, and not so bright yellow legs. Still moulting primaries at this time of year (p10 not fully grown) indicates heuglini (vegae x taimyrensis) or vegae.
Second one looks like a vegae, heavely streaked, but more obvious in the neck. Dark around eye with a dark line in front, and behind the eye and rather pale iris reminds off schisisagus, but also vegae, together with underwing pattern and late moult.
http://www.magikbirds.com/image.asp?title_id=509&show_thumbnails=Fal se
http://www.surfbirds.com/ID%20Articles/JapanGulls/index.html
http://user.chollian.net/~aves/news/0502/news050204-heugull.htm
JanJ
Forgot to mention, very nice images!
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| « Last Edit: Dec 23rd, 2005, 8:42am by JanJ » |
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Anguslau
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Re: Herring gulls 銀鷗
« Reply #2 on: Dec 23rd, 2005, 12:18pm » |
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Very nice images indeed! Look forward to seeing them again soon.
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gjcarey
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Re: Herring gulls 銀鷗
« Reply #3 on: Dec 28th, 2005, 10:16am » |
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Both photos were taken at the end of March, and both birds show uncompleted primary moult. This indicates that neither bird can be pure vegae, whose primary moult is generally complete by late December or January, aside from exceptional (sick) individuals.
The first bird looks like classic HK heuglini to me. The late date is the cause of the very restricted head streaking and the brighter, more orange tone to the legs (the feet in particular). The head and neck do not have the bulk and size that I associate with vegae, and there is a single mirror on p10. I see no pro-vegae features in this bird at all.
The second is a hybrid of vegae and heuglini. As Jan says, the pinkish legs and heavy neck streaking indicate vegae; in addition, the lengths of head and bill also point to that species, as does the second mirror on p9. However, the moult is incomplete, and so late in the winter this must indicate introgression of vegae genes. It would be interesting to have seen the upperpart coloration in comparison with the typical heuglini we get here. This bird is actually pretty close to vegae, but the moult is problematic.
If one calls this vegae x heuglini individual 'taimyrensis', then this it what it is, though personally I'm still unsure what the birds in HK are. I know what they look like, but I don't know what they are.
Geoff
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