[Maine-birds] Kennebunk Little Gull photos

I have posted a couple of photos of the Little Gulls at Lords Point,
Kennebunk, yesterday. One photo shows all three:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/68931408@N04/7394451814/
and another two of the birds:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/68931408@N04/7394451814/

Because the birds might be at moderate distance and with wings folded,
thus hiding the prominent dark bar across the upper wing, looking for
the Little Gulls might be a challenge. In direct comparison, size is
helpful, but that may not be the easiest way to spot the birds. For
me, the solidly dark, even black, tertials are a good mark. These
showed well at a distance. (Tertials are the large and rounded
feathers at the base of where the primaries stick out on the folded
wing.) By contrast, immature Bonaparte's show paler and browner
tertials that have a white in them. Also look for the black primaries
that are highlighted by a prominent white "stripe" along the upper
side of the folded wedge formed by the primaries (as one looks at the
wingtips). This white is formed by the broad white tips across the
inner primaries on Little Gull. Immature Bonaparte's have black tips
across their primaries and secondaries; so they don't show this white
"stripe" on the folded primaries.

Louis Bevier
Fairfield

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