Kumlien's Gull - Larus glaucoides kumlieni
Adults
Adult, Nimmo's Pier, Galway February 2009.
This adult shows the darkest end of primary colour.
- The head is small in relation to body size
_ The eye is strikingly pale with deep dark red orbital ring
- The bill is small and slender with a distinct greyish base, red gonys spot and bright yellow on the culmen
- The upper-parts are pale to mid grey; paler than surrounding Herring Gulls but darker than Iceland Gull.
- The legs are bright pink
- The white tertial crescent is broad whilst the white tips to the sub-scapulars are small
- The primaries: this is main feature of the bird. They are slaty grey, not black, with large white tips and with a large white mirrorr visible on P9. On P6 the black sub-terminal band is diffuse, split by the white feather shaft and doesn't extend to the feather edges.
Adult, Nimmo's Pier, Galway February 2009.
These inflight shots clearly show the primary pattern:
- P10 has a large white tip with only the smallest of dark 'notches' whilst the slaty grey outer web extends to the primary coverts, the inner web is grey
- P9 Large white tip and large white mirror which bleeds into the whitish inner web of the feather. The slaty grey outer web extends 90% of the length of the feather.
- P8 has a large white tip whilst the blackish outer web tapers back to a point, there is an obvious and abrupt narrowing two thirds of the way along. The inner web is white.
- P7 Broad black band which extends back along the outer edge of the outer web. There is a distinct white area behind the band and the grey of the mid feather.
- P6 Diffuse grey band which is split by the white feather shaft.
Broad white trailing edge