The Rare Birds of Coney Island

Eventually, I'll get some text up here to illuminate some of the finer points of chasing this bird, but until then, here are some photos. This was my first cross state border twitch, and it was well worth it!! The experience of such an amazing bird on the boardwalk of Coney Island was nearly too much! Anyway, here are some photos

Here, the rare Gray-headed Gull hangs out with some other rare Coney Island creatures


The Gull seemed to exert some dominance, grabbing food in front of larger Ring-billed Gulls and Laughing Gulls


At times, even though it was such a good bird, it was easy to get distracted!


The local kids had no idea how special this bird was and chased it like any other rat with wings


My focus was still on manual, so I kind of blew these two shots in flight, but they're still fun with the rides in the background


Against the Wonder Wheel!


It was really quite the scene!


Here you can see the conspicuous white wing patches behind the black in the wing tips. A very obvious character that sets it apart from the Laughing Gulls in flight.


Here you can see that the bird seems to be molting one of its primaries in both wings.


Even the locals broke out their iphones for some pix!


The cops kept their eyes on the Connecticut contingent while they kept their eyes on the Gull!!


It really is a handsome bird!!