I wish they all could be California Gulls

After 4 years of gull-watching by the Lake, I'm slowly getting better at telling them apart--at least, telling the "EASY" ones apart!

So here's a ring-billed gull. The key here is that it has a black beak stripe. Hey, if you liked that beak you shoulda put a ring on it. There's no mistaking this gull, it's a dead-ringer. Ha. Ha. But what's great about getting a freebie gull is that you can use it as your benchmark to compare other, harder gulls. Thus you can ask, is is larger or smaller than a ring-billed? Is it darker or paler? Mew gulls are about the same size, Western gulls, somewhat larger, and glaucous-winged gulls seems gigantic compared to this one. Other field marks are the yellow eye and legs.

Here we have giaganto gull, the Glaucous-winged. "Glaucous" means "cloudy" (like glaucoma) so it's kind of a romantic notion. "On wings of cloud..." The dirty reality is, look at the wingtips. Unlike other common Lake Merritt gulls, they are the same color as the back--light grey. It's like seeing them through a cloud. Or something. Other field marks to check: pink legs, dark eye. When young these dudes are also very pale. I think of them as "Vanilla."

Everytime I see this one, I sing to myself: "Oakland town's a dead-end world, East-End boys and Western Gulls [WEST-ERN GULLS doo dooo doo dood dooo d'do]". Here's where knowing the ring-bill well comes in handy. If it's bigger AND darker, then it's a Western. Also note pink legs and (theoretically) yellow eye (although this eye looks dark in the photo. GULLS IS TRICKSY)

The first two gulls I only see in winter. That's because in summer they go up to the arctic and have crazy orgies where they hybridize and make things all difficult for birwatchers trying to ID their hapa babies. Western gull is pretty much always around, because it breeds on islands in the Pacific ocean. With such a short commute, I guess it has more time for loitering.

This last gull is one I'm just getting to know. I recently realized that I have probably been seeing it all along and not noticing that it's a different species. Also, it's not supposed to be on the coast in summer. This one must have declined to go breed on a river island in Utah. I can understand that. Anyway, it's a California Gull. Can't you tell by the tiny bit of black there on the beak tip? And can't you see the red eye ring? HAHAHAHAHA. Ok the easiest way to tell is to look at the legs, and, again, compare to others. They're not yellow like a ring billed, not pink like a western. They're kind of bluish grey. And it took me a long time to figure this out because both of my field guides paint the legs far yellower. Sorry, Sibley, ya failed me on this one.


Anyway, I've only been noticing the California gull in the last few weeks, and I wondered if that's because it's only here in summer, or if I just never noticed it before. So I checked out ebird (which is SO FUN for anyone who likes Data with a capital D) and discovered.... INSUFFICIENT DATA!

I got curious and checked out the stats for all of Lake Merritt... and I found that there is INSUFFICIENT DATA for almost every species between April and August... even Canada Geese! I think this is because most people come to the lake in winter to see the cool winter ducks. But who'd bother coming out and writing down that they saw some lousy old gulls, geese, robins, and pigeons? Well, now that I know about this gaping hole in the data, I for one will be happy to sacrifice... for Science!