Waiting Out High Tide With an Olympic Gull

Waiting for the tide to turn takes patience. My companion on the wait for a high tide last November was this large gull. I thought my patient partner was a herring gull, but I took a closer look and changed my mind.

The subject of my weight(less) contribution has intermediate traits – a dark but not too dark mantle and dark but not black wingtips. My guess is that this is a western gull x glaucous-winged gull hybrid, what birders informally refer to as an Olympic gull. They are common along the coast in the Pacific Northwest, USA.

Here are a couple of informative links on Olympic gulls.

http://eastsideaudubon.org/birding/birding_resources/gallery/gulls-terns-jaegers/pink-legged-gulls-glaucous-winged-western-and-herring

http://nwbackyardbirder.blogspot.com/2012/01/separating-first-winter-thayers-gull.html

Weight(less)