Hello everyone and welcome to July or as I call it now “Ja’ Y’d You F Up Your Summer”. Just a quick update, I made it through surgery and everywhere I walk the 6 Million Dollar Man theme can now be heard. Big thanks to my wife for having to pick up the slack (although hiding my running shoes is a bit cruel!), Brad has been keeping my spirits up and truly appreciate all of your kind thoughts and wishes for a speedy recovery. Unfortunately, I have a ways to go…not to mention now having to tear the house apart for my shoes…the race is this weekend!!!! Luckily, Brad has several posts in the hopper to fill the void. Take care everyone.
Take it away Brad…
Doesn’t that title remind you of a song from the hair bands of the 1980’s, MTV, and a specific lifeguard sitcom? Just try to get that out of your head while you read the story.
In the past, we at Intrigued have talked about “LBJ’s” (little brown jobbers). There should also be an acronym for the nearly endless variety of gulls. The company Brian and I used to work for had thousands of acronyms. There were so many . . . how many were there . . . there were so many acronyms that we had a spiral-bound notebook just to be able to keep track of them all. Whenever I see a seagull flying around, even this far inland in central Illinois, I think it’s just another seagull, or just another gull (JAG). The word “seagull” is a generic term for any gull-like bird near water. Many of the “gulls” I see on a regular basis are nowhere near a major body of water. I don’t normally take the time to tell the gulls apart. I usually just call it a seagull, remind myself to tag it later in Lightroom as a “gull”, and then move onto the business of enjoying the rest of our vacation.
On our recent winter trip to South Carolina, I was doing the same thing. Jan and I took photos of “gulls” we saw flying near the ocean. It wasn’t really until we took a walk on Sunset Beach that I realized “Hey, these don’t all look the same.” I thought, “Great, something else I need to identify when we get home.” And before anyone asks, I don’t think any of these were named Jonathon Livingston.
Hit the jump to see more gulls, gulls, gulls!
In reality, we ended up photographing three species of gull on this vacation: Bonaparte’s, ring-billed, and laughing gulls. I know exactly what you are thinking, but no, the Bonaparte’s gull isn’t named after Emperor Napolean. The Bonaparte’s gull is named after his nephew (or cousin depending on which source you read) Charles Lucien Bonaparte for his important contributions to American ornithology in the 1820s. And no to your second question, they didn’t have their right-hand wing tucked in their feathers.
Gull identification can be like trying to tell identical quadruplets apart from their school photos. A Bonaparte’s gull looks similar to a laughing gull which is similar to a Franklin’s gull. Leg color, bill color, and the size of the white eye ring are all primary clues. Secondary clues for me are: the white spots on the tail feathers, the color of the feathers on their backs, and how far up the neck the color continues. Another important identifier can be knowing who they hang out with. (I just ended a sentence with a preposition, please don’t tell my high school English teacher, sorry Mr. B.). The Sibley and Cornell web sites both made identification a bit easier. When all else fails, use the maps to see if that gull is even supposed to be in that area at that time of year. (Maps helped rule out a Franklin’s gull being in South Carolina). Or ask an expert if you have one handy. For example, I just ring up the A.I.D. (Avian Identification Department) at Intrigued Corporate for help.
I’m going to talk about the gulls in the order I mentioned them above: Bonaparte’s, ring-billed, then laughing.
A key feature of non-breeding adult Bonaparte’s gull (Chroicocephalus philadelphia), at least from the photos I was able to capture, are the dark “ear” spots on the sides of their heads. That and their orange-pink legs help tell them apart from other species. The white eye ring is rather thin in comparison to the laughing gull. Fun fact: Bonaparte’s gull are the only gull species that nest in trees.
We observed a behavior on Sunset Beach called “conveyor belt foraging.” It’s a most mesmerizing technique, often seen in the Great Lakes and both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
On this particular day, the skies were heavily overcast, looming low and ominous. There was a very strong wind driving sand and salt spray into our faces. The gulls did not seem deterred. A group of Bonaparte’s gulls would fly upwind (left to right as you are reading this), just above the water’s surface, dipping down to seize a small fish. As they reached the end of the food patch near the pier they fly upward, where the wind catches them, bringing them quickly to the end of the queue (right to left this time) where the process starts over. The wind was so strong that day that it seemed like only the Bonaparte’s gulls were brave enough to take flight. Even then, they were keeping low, right next to the sand on the upwind flights. If I didn’t know any better (and I probably don’t) I’d say they were having fun while grabbing an in-flight snack from time to time. We’d see them ride the wind back up the beach for a mile or two at high speed. A few minutes later, we’d see what looked like the same group flying low into the wind after starting the process all over again.
Ring-billed gull (Larus delawarensis) adults on the other hand are pretty simple to identify. They have a black ring around their bill near the end leaving a tiny bit of yellow at the tip.
Older than juvenile, not quite adult, or second winter, ring-billed gulls have a grey/blue back, but are still brown spotted nearly everywhere else. They don’t quite have the distinctive ring on their bill yet.
Ring-billed gull parents will nest on sparsely vegetated ground (sandbars, rocky beaches, bare rock) near fresh water. These gull colonies can have as few as twenty, or as many as tens of thousands of nesting pairs. Many will choose to nest in the same colony where they hatched.
Adult ring-billed gulls will sometimes “play” by dropping an object mid-flight and then diving to catch it. We didn’t see any “playing” or flying on this very windy day.
I think this one was making fun of me trying to get a steady photo in 20MPH winds with blowing sand and salt spray.
Which leads us to our next exhibit for today.
Adult laughing gulls (Leucophaeus atricilla) have a black head, reddish bill and reddish legs (when not badly underexposed or backlit). Their white eye ring is thicker than the adult Bonaparte’s gull. They can often be seen, well, laughing. They look very similar to a Franklin’s gull, but the territories don’t overlap anywhere near South Carolina
Non-breeding adults are a bit easier to tell apart from the Bonaparte’s gull.
A non-breeding laughing gull has the partially black head feathers, while the Bonaparte’s has only the ear spots mentioned above. The bill is also larger on a laughing gull than on a Bonaparte’s gull, which is almost dainty in comparison.
Both laughing gull parents will build a nest together. They carefully select a location on sand, rocks, or somewhere else hidden among leaves of low plants. Laughing gull nests are located on slightly elevated spots to minimize the chance of flooding by storms or high tides. Despite the name, they are serious parents, keeping the nest free of egg shell fragments that might stick to unhatched eggs, preventing them from hatching. Laughing gulls are monogamous breeders with pairs sticking together, sometimes for several breeding seasons.
I think this one really wanted me to leave.
Thank you for reading. If you want to see more bird photos from our South Carolina winter escape, please visit here.
Credits
Thanks again to Jan and Allyson for proofreading and editing. Thanks to Jan for many of the photos in this article.
Wildlife Intrigued 
Thanks for this story about Gulls and the differences between them. I hope, maybe one day, you may find Jonathan Livingston (my favorite gull ever).
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Thank you. Me too.
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Nice photos of this handsome species. I’d love to see some gulls other than the ring-billed gull which is very common around here.
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Thanks Belinda. You never know what may be lurking in the large groups of gulls. At first I thought they were all the same here. Where we live, only one species is silly enough to venture this far inland: Herring gulls.
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I’ll have to look more closely.
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Gulls are such sassy birds. Great write up and photos.
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Thank you Tim. At least none of them tried to attack the cameras on that windy day.
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Yes, I agree – pictures now, ID later with gulls. I like your Laughing Gull photos.
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Thank you very much. I’ve tried to learn to use Merlin within a few minutes of the photos, so I at least have a memory jogger when I am sorting and identifying later.
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Oh, lord…Motley Crue & Baywatch…
Love the hollering gulls. They always remind me of Finding Nemo…”mine, mine, mine…” LOL!
Brian, heal fast.
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That’s exactly what I was thinking as I saw all of them, Mine Mine Mine! And you are the first one to mention the reference in the title, so congrats! Thanks for stopping by.
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I am forever marked by Finding Nemo. “AH…SHUT UP! You’re nothing but rats with wings!” LOL!
I can actually *hear* Motley Crue singing it like “Gulls, Gulls, Gulls…” And, Baywatch…I never could watch that show (made my IQ drop). I had an ex-boyfriend that called it “Boob Watch.” Hasselhoff was cool in Knight Rider but, the slow motion beach running…NO.
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I missed all of Baywatch thankfully, perpetual night school while working back then.
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You missed nothing. Trust me.
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Your ex nailed the real name, that’s for sure.
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Thanks Vic, I’m trying my best, but right now the body doesn’t seem to appreciate the infusion of metal objects – best part so far is I get my stitches out this Thursday and I am pretty sure I heard the doctor say when that is done I can immediately head to the trail…(but don’t tell Linda, she might have a different take on what the doctor said).
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I won’t say a word.
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Appreciate it, although Linda was very pointed with the doctor today (got my stitches out this morning). I hard a lot of blah blah blah and then something like “sure he can go trail running tomorrow” which was pleasing to the ears (there is a chance that line was followed by “if he is an idiot”, but by then I was already figuring out what the best shoe was for the current conditions and wasn’t paying attention).
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It’s good to be adored by your wife, though…yes?
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Yes, {looks sheepishly down at ground} she’s far better than I deserve, that’s for sure.
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Awwwwww…🥰
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Gulls are a challenge. 😉
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I was warned of that beforehand. Though being new to birding, I don’t know what I don’t know yet. I do know that gulls are nearly as hard as LBJ’s to identify, especially since there are so many hybrids around. Thanks for stopping by Sherry.
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Some thrushes, sparrow, warblers, flycatchers, and sparrows can be a challenge too 😁 I’ve been learning for decades and still can’t ID them all. It’s part of the fun.
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Precisely! Though my LBJ folders are getting rather large of late.
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We have people here who devote all their bird watching to Larids, takes all sorts I suppose.
I have seen all three species in my part of the UK but not Franklins so feel free to send one over.
Make sure B1’s running shoes are kept well hidden until he is fitted with a set of stabilisers, crash bars and air bags!!!
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I thought about sending him a couple of rolls of bubble wrap, one for each elbow. It’s up to Linda to hide the shoes well enough he can’t find them. He could always grab a pair from his Halloween exhibits though.
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I found the shoes!!!! (I also keep a backup pair hidden in my closet after she pulled that trick when I collapsed at the CMAR race). What I wasn’t expecting is her calling my race buddies (one being the race director of the ultra I ended up missing) and letting them know in no uncertain terms I was not to be allowed to run…she’s evil I tell ya’! Note, I am open to putting bubble wrap on the tree that clobbered me.
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Hey now B. you are starting to sound like my wife. Although, I will accept putting an entire roll of bubble wrap around that tree trunk – at least until I stop flinching whenever I see it. I keep having flashbacks in my sleep and startling myself awake.
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I didn’t realize there were so many different types of gulls, as I’ve always thought them to be quite pesky – until now. This was interesting read, and your photos are outstanding. Thank you for the lesson.
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You are very welcome. And thank you for the compliment. I learned I have only scratched the surface with the various types of gulls in the US. That means I reserve the right to update my stories at any time in the future as I learn more. Thankfully, these were more focused on staying upright in the wind than bothering tourists with cameras.
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Y’all certainly had a great trip to South Carolina! This was a great post highlighting those gull species.
Gulls are the sparrows of the water bird world. They even go one step further in making their i.d. a challenge by looking different in their 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc., years.
All I know is visiting the beach without hearing gulls screeching just wouldn’t be the same.
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Exactly Wally! Not much says “seashore” than the cry of a gull, whichever one it is. While I don’t have any TBD gulls from that trip, I still have one or two LBJ’s. That must mean we need another seashore trip next February.
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Thanks for posting these images of similar gulls. I can’t get over the optical illusion where the Bonaparte’s looks like he is flying sideways while staring right at me. That’s probably a very effective defense mechanism!
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I know Sam, it was eerie. I didn’t even notice it until we were home reviewing the photos. I have one like that of a Great Blue Heron from a subsequent trip. I’m finding that as the sample size of photos increases, I’m more likely to catch photos like that. Though someday I need to learn single shot mode on my cameras. But rapid fire is so much more fun!
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I can relate, Brad. It took me years before I tried to identify what type of gull I’m looking at, and there are only a few I can reliably name. Trying to learn them will be a neverending project.
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Tanja, I completely agree. I’m not sure if I can name them in the moment unless they stand still long enough for me to check out their features. The Bonaparte’s are a dead giveaway at this stage, as are the Laughing gulls. But those middle-schoolers are tough to tell apart. Thanks for flying by.
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Tanja, I completely agree. I’m not sure if I can name them in the moment unless they stand still long enough for me to check out their features. The Bonaparte’s are a dead giveaway at this stage, as are the Laughing gulls. But those middle-schoolers are tough to tell apart. Thanks for flying by.
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