The life of an Irish birder : Ireland's first Juvenile Baltic gull?

Ireland’s first juvenile Baltic Gull?

Bray Harbour, September 2nd 2020

While on my lunch break from doing a garden tidy up for a client in Bray, Co. Wicklow myself and my work colleague decided to have our food while sitting looking at the gulls, more of my idea! As we were sitting there eating away, I kept one eye on the gulls. Up to thirty in the harbour, mainly sitting on the beach. As I looked up a tiny gull flew and landed in front of the car. It looked quite like the size of a common gull. As I got out of the car to check what it could be I was greeted with a tiny juvenile lesser black-backed gull! Instinctually I was intrigued by this bird. I only had my phone camera that I could try and get some record shots with, lucky enough I got a couple. Which really showed the size difference between it and a 1cy herring gull. I got back into the car and told my work colleague that I needed to go home and get my camera as this could be a very rare gull!

I decided to put the news out of an interesting 1cy lesser black-backed gull that was showing characteristics of a baltic gull. I also rang some local birders such as my good friend Stephen King and sent some pictures from my phone to Brian Mccloskey and Joe Proudfoot. The timing for a juvenile baltic gull to turn up in Ireland was just perfect, as they leave their breeding grounds in the baltic sea region and are known as a long distance migrant. After being seen for several days by quite a few birders the bird then seemed to move on, a good sign that it did not hang around for the winter and continued its journey.

I see no reason for these very elegant gulls not to be turning up on Irish soil as they are long distance migrants. We just need to keep documenting these candidate birds, and getting DNA samples if possible. One day we might get lucky and find a bird with some bling! I had received some very positive comments regarding this bird from several birders that have vast experience with these gulls. And I would like to thank them for their help. Especially Alan Dalton who was one of the first people I contacted with back of the camera images while I was still watching the bird. Even if this bird turned out not to be a baltic it is still a great learning curve regarding 1cy lesser black-backed gulls from an Irish point of view. If we don’t look and photograph such birds then how can we ever expect to get to grips with their identification!

Link below to Birding frontiers fuscus work:

https://birdingfrontiers.wordpress.com/2013/09/23/juvenile-baltic-gull/)

(Larus fuscus (gull-research.org))

Some very similar 1cy baltic gulls can be seen in this above link.

1cy Baltic gull candidate - Bray harbour, Wicklow - Cian Cardiff - September 3rd 2020

This was one of the best images I managed of this elegant gull over its week or more stay. The fact that this bird did not hang around too long may also be a good indication of its origin.

1cy baltic gull candidate bray harbour - Cian Cardiff

1cy baltic gull candidate with herring gulls - Bray harbour - Stephen King

Possible baltic gull and 1cy herring gulls - Brian Mccloskey

1cy baltic gull candidate with herring gulls - Bray harbour - Stephen King

Showing off the silver toned underwing, a nice feature of a baltic gull.

1cy baltic gull candidate with herring gulls - Bray harbour - Stephen King

1cy baltic gull candidate with 1cy herring gulls - Cian Cardiff

This is one of the first images I managed to take on my smartphone after first seeing this bird. It was just a few feet away from me running around in amongst the hordes of herring gulls. It was just tiny compared to any herring it met.