Date: 11/5/25 10:52 am From: Kate Edwards <kmedwards400...> Subject: Re: [MBBIRDS] Juvenile Gull ID Help
Hi Phil,
Thanks for the response -- I think Iceland Gulls will just continue to
confuse me for some time. The photo I attached does make the bill look
bi-colored from the lighting, but the other pictures in the checklist have
it more consistently black with maybe some grey at the very base. I've
attached one below.
Blake Matheson also suggested that this individual could be a first winter
Herring vs a Ring-Billed. Would you agree, or is this one just better
left un-identified?
Thanks,
Kate
[image: Thayers3.JPG]
On Wed, Oct 29, 2025 at 4:27 PM Phil Brown <pdpbrown...> wrote:
> Hi Kate,
> Iceland Gull (Thayer's) should have pale edging to the primaries, and the
> primaries look too dark to me, The bill looks bi-colored too (a bit hard to
> tell from this angle).
> Regards, Phil Brown
>
> On Wed, Oct 29, 2025 at 4:13 PM Kate Edwards <kmedwards400...>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> I was reviewing some photos of a flock of gulls I took at the San Lorenzo
>> River mouth back in February 2023. My SD card filled up so I'm finally
>> getting around to sorting through them. At the time I remember taking
>> photos of any odd juveniles to a) help my identification skills and b)
>> hopefully capture an Iceland gull in the flock I could ID later. There were
>> most of our N. California species present with Short-billed, Ring-Billed,
>> Western, California, and at least a couple of Herring.
>>
>> One of them I landed on as a juvenile Ring-Billed gull due to a
>> combination of size, black on just the tip of the bill, and overall
>> messiness of the plumage. The pink legs threw me off at first, but I found
>> other images on eBird showing them with pink feet during the first year or
>> so. Photos of this one are uploaded here
>> <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/644334666>.
>>
>> This other one is probably the same, but the plumage seemed a little more
>> uniform and the bill was fully black. The head shape also seemed different,
>> but that field marker has always been hard for me to distinguish. I think
>> I'm leaning towards Ring-Billed, but I just have to check I don't have a
>> photo of a lifer sitting right in front of me.
>>
>> More pictures of both birds can be found on my ebird checklist here
>> <https://ebird.org/checklist/S127970740>. I appreciate any tips to
>> getting reliable ID's on these little guys!
>>
>> Happy birding,
>> Kate Edwards
>>
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>
