I rarely go out without my binoculars. When I do, I feel rather tense, in case an unusual bird should appear. But I decided that a stroll through Gravesend with my two-year-old grandson was unlikely to test my birding skills.
On the way, I showed Sammy the usual sparrows, starlings, feral pigeons and a flock of black-headed gulls loafing about on the Thames foreshore. Then I noticed that some had a blacker head than their familiar cousins, and their wings were not tipped with black, but pure white. These features, along with their blood-red bill, made them look like a black-headed gull with a makeover.
They were, of course, Mediterranean gulls. Back in Somerset, this is a scarce visitor – I’ve seen just one this year on my coastal patch. But in Kent they are common residents, and we now see them every time we visit Sammy’s favourite playground.
The species’ name is misleading, as Mediterranean gulls are not especially common around the Med. When I began birding, they mainly bred near the Black Sea, and were considered globally threatened. But in recent decades they have spread north and west to colonise Britain.
Yet unlike other newish arrivals, such as the collared dove, Cetti’s warbler and great white egret, they have stayed under the radar – probably because people tend to lump them into the catch-all category “seagull”. So next time you are visiting a seaside town in southern England, look out for these attractive birds.
