Glaucous Gull - Stubber's Green, West Midlands

Sticking on the theme of gulls, this morning Austin and I made the hour-and-a-half drive to Stubber's Green, on the outskirts of Walsall, for the long-staying juvenile Glaucous Gull. As with Iceland Gull, this was still a species I was yet to see.

Thankfully, the juvenile Glaucous Gull showed really well almost as soon as we arrived at the site. The gulls were mainly congregated along the shoreline of a lake which had formed into a wet meadow. It was striking how much larger and more brutish the Glaucous Gull was compared to the other gulls, which included Lesser Black-Backed, Herring, Common and Black-Headed.

The Glaucous Gull was closer to the size of the geese than the other gulls!

However, as we were trying to get a better vantage point, all the gulls suddenly shot up. Worried that we might have inadvertently flushed them, we were shocked to see a very scrawny Red Fox trotting towards the birds. The fox made little attempt at taking any of the birds but made sure the Glaucous Gull didn't return for the next 30 minutes or so.

There were plenty of other birds around - lots of Cormorants, Lapwing, a few Little Egret, Wigeon and Oystercatcher. A 1st winter Caspian Gull was reported, but we weren't confident enough to pick it out!


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