Ring-legged Gull

During the winter, there was an interesting young Herring Gull (if that's not a contradiction in terms) loafing around the pier in Deal. It had a large coloured ring on its right leg, and a metal one on the left.

This photo was sent to the RSPCA at Mallydams Wood, Hastings, where the colour ring was registered, and a reply was received from Richard:

A5BD, GC23387, was admitted as an orphan from Worthing. It remained in
the centre for 41 days and was released 18/7/07 from Pett Level beach [about 30 miles away, as the gull flies].
This is the first sighting of this bird.

He also answered a question about the winter's oiled seabirds:


We have released so far 56 birds over the past 3 weeks.We only have about 15 left now.
We expect to release between 45-50% of all oiled bird admissions.
This is may sound a low number, but actually an awful lot of the birds come in emaciated,
ingested a lot of oil and very weak. We have been gathering data on oiled birds for the past 10 years. We do know that swift rescue,early
re-hydration and if they are preferentially brought to us first ,rather than taken to another centre first, they have an above average chance of
release. Many Vets or other centres, wash the birds too quickly and the poor things fail to regain the energy they lose during the wash and are
more susceptible to infection later. 

The peak months for oiled birds admissions for the Kent and Sussex area is late December to late March, with a peak in February. If you are
interested in helping with the oiled birds in the next year, please keep in touch.