This is probably a laughing gull somewhere on the road to adulthood.
It takes them 2-3 years to gain adult plumage.
the amazing “feet” of standing on one leg.
He stayed like that the whole time we were eating.
There were no herring gulls there that evening, not even my friend with the mangled leg. But we were well entertained by these visitors.
Great photos – You got some wonderful closeups of the gulls.
Thank you, Sheryl! They’re so much fun to photograph. They almost seem to be posing.
Wonderful and fun. 🙂 I love gulls.
Me, too. They have so much personality! 🙂
I’ve never quite understood why birds like to stand on one leg. In the winter, I’ve always thought they do it to keep one leg at a time, warm, but then they do it in warm weather too! Maybe it’s like we sometimes lean on things.
You’re correct, Val. They do it to keep warm. Now that I think of it, it was chilly and windy that evening. I wished I had brought a jacket.
According to BirdNote(dot)org:
“Birds’ legs have an adaptation called “rete mirabile” that minimizes heat loss. The arteries that transport warm blood into the legs lie in contact with the veins that return colder blood to the bird’s heart. The arteries warm the veins. Because the veins also cool the arteries, the bird’s feet are closer to environmental temperature and thus don’t lose as much heat as they would if they were at body temperature. And by standing on one leg, a bird reduces by half the amount of heat lost through unfeathered limbs.”
Great to know, thanks so much!
You’re welcome!