Subject: Fwd: Renton GBBG comment, ID-F response
Date: Feb 2 21:40:59 2004
From: Eugene and Nancy Hunn - enhunn at comcast.net


Kathy,

We are all gull experts.

Gene.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Kathy Andrich" <chukarbird at yahoo.com>
To: <philliplc at harborside.com>; <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Monday, February 02, 2004 4:53 PM
Subject: Re: Fwd: Renton GBBG comment, ID-F response


> Hi Everyone,
>
> This may be a redundant question but have any of the
> people who commented on this gull been nationaly or
> internationally known gull experts? What would they
> think or would they have time to peruse the photo's
> and comment?
>
> I may in left field asking this, as I am not sure who
> is expert, but have read many comments about this
> gull's possible parentage and wonder, is all the
> measuring of photo's, etc. necessary?
>
> Then again I noticed shortly after begining birding
> how people like to "discuss" the fine points of birds
> they are looking at.
>
> By the way I did go once to look for the gull but it
> was out to lunch, probably at the landfill.
>
> Kathy
>
> Kathy Andrich
> Roosting in Kent
> chukarbird at yahoo.com
>
>
> --- Phillip Pickering <philliplc at harborside.com>
> wrote:
> > > Structurally it's prefect, and I see
> > > nothing to suggest it's any type of hybrid.
> >
> >
> > My opinion aside, if that were true why would some
> > of those
> > who are intimately familiar with GBBG have expressed
> > such a low
> > comfort level with the structure? (both on the list
> > and in personal
> > comm.) If it were structurally perfect that wouldn't
> > happen, at
> > least not to anywhere near the extent it has. The
> > series of photos is
> > excellent, and there's no reason to suspect that
> > they are misleading
> > anyone.
> >
> > I bring this up (again, sorry) to amplify the point
> > that there are
> > both multiple positive and negative opinions out
> > there about
> > this bird - and it seems that, at least for some in
> > Washington, the
> > tendency might be to give more weight to the
> > positive and be less
> > attentive of the negative, when in the case of a
> > potential first state
> > record such as this the exact opposite should be
> > true. Even if you
> > don't agree with them, the fact that others who are
> > familiar with
> > GBBG are questioning it at all should be
> > disconcerting for such an
> > extralimital bird, particularly if you take
> > seriously Tony Leukering's
> > argument about intergrades potentially being more
> > prone to
> > wander out of range than pure birds.
> >
> > As for myself, in extensive photo study (pushing 300
> > photos of well
> > over 200 birds) I have not been able to find a GBBG
> > that shows a
> > structure similar to the Washington bird. Compared
> > to their body bulk
> > GBBG seem to invariably have proportionately larger
> > heads, eyes, and
> > bills, seem to almost invariably be more attenuated
> > in the rear and have
> > much flatter bellies, and seem to almost invariably
> > have a steeper, less
> > gradual culmen downcurve. If 200+ birds can be
> > considered an
> > adequate sample, at the fine level necessary to
> > confirm it IMO as
> > a whole the bird does not appear to be within the
> > normal structural
> > range of variation of pure GBBG *at all*. The
> > structure is that odd.
> > As Alvaro said, it doesn't really fit anything,
> > which for me sounds a
> > fire alarm that, even though the patterning is close
> > to GBBG, there
> > is still a very high probability of it being an
> > intergrade.
> >
> > Respectfully,
> >
> > Phil Pickering
> > Lincoln City, Oregon
> > philliplc at harborside.com
>
>
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