Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Harbour Seagulls

Seagull, port, harbor, LivornoI have been trying hard to catch a seagull in flight, but it is not easy with the zoom at full power, this is the best I got last Friday.Seagull, port, harbor, LivornoAfter City Seagulls, I tried to catch these birds in their more favorable environment, the harbour.Seagull, port, harbor, LivornoI am not sure this is a seagull proper, I found it almost mimetic in this kind of sea. Any advice from experts about this bird would be welcome.

29 comments:

Cezar and Léia said...

You did a fabulous work, beautiful shots!
Léia

Leif Hagen said...

Soaring seagull! Standing seagull! Swimming seagull! Super subjects!

Lowell said...

That first shot is really quite magnificent. I've tried to shoot them in flight, too, and about all I do is get pooped on when they soar overhead!

I dunno the last bird...looks like the poor thing is lost.

Glad you recognized the building on Paree today! ;-)

Have a great afternoon and evening!

Hilda said...

I think you did very well with the flying seagull — it's beautiful! And you're right about the third bird, whatever it is. Very interesting.

brattcat said...

You did a fantastic job of catching the gull in flight. It's an ennobling photo. Even those who are not crazy about gulls could admire this photo and its subject.

B SQUARED said...

I'd say you managed to capture the first Gull pretty well. You should give advice!

Saretta said...

The gull in flight is fantastic! Good job!

VP said...

@ B SQUARED - My advice is very simple: shoot about one thousand shots vaguely in direction of any flying object for about six months.
Delete 950 out of focus and fuzzy images and 40 neat ugly pigeons. Delete the remaining nine half seagulls and, with a bit of luck, it's done.

margaret said...

One thousand for six months? I see where I have gone wrong :) Edinburgh is full of gulls, including the huge ones we call herring gulls, but when I was little even though we're on the sea we never saw them in the town. If we did the old people would say, "bad weather at sea."

nobu said...

I loved seagull.
Nice shots!

Ming the Merciless said...

The last photo is either a baby seagull that hasn't shed its baby feathers or it's a female seagull.

In the animal kingdom, males are more attractive than females. :-)

Frank said...

Your expert technigue for getting one good shot is hilarious. Isn't that what we ALL do at times to capture one good scene? Boats, planes, cars, birds, pelicans... Love your response!!

Victor said...

That top photo is top notch. Bravo!

Tinsie said...

Great shots, especially the first one.

crocrodyl said...

I like the first shot! Great composition!

cieldequimper said...

I had to laugh so hard at Jacob! The first shot is beautiful, you did really well. I don't even try... ;-)

James said...

These are great pictures of the sea gulls. Somehow I missed your last post but the Benefactor's room is very impressive.

stromsjo said...

Part of the airborne division incoming - an action shot!

The gulls are certainly something our cities have in common.

A home far away said...

What a lovely photos!
I`m a swedish woman living in Singapore, I´m at the moment in Sweden but I fly back to Singapore on Sunday, I can´t wait:)

Hugs Gunilla

Baruch said...

Love the seagull shot against the blue sky

tapirgal said...

You did a nice job with the flying seagull, and even better was your description! I thought the third one would be a juvenile. Ming says it could be a female. I'll have to research some more. We have so many here and I enjoy watching them. There was a good display of seagulls at the Natural History museum in Santa Barbara, California, and that's where I first learned about the darker coloring being a juvenile. I don't remember what they said about females.

Anonymous said...

I'm an Adams fan and I think the Vogon Poet name is very clever - the way you described photographing birds would make Adams proud. Nothing on your blog induces pain as vogon poetry should - it is all joy!

Kcalpesh said...

These are lovely pictures! It will be a dream come true for me when I'll manage to capture pictures like these :-)

VP said...

@ ellievellie - Sometimes I forget why I chose Vogon Poet as a nick... You are one of the few who noticed!
As the dolphins (or our gulls) may say: so long, and thanks for all the fish!

margaret said...

I think Ming is right. The baby gulls being raised on the office building below mine look like that but fluffier and today I saw one just like the photo flying chaotically off a ledge in town into a bunch of people to get some food - definitely a young bird who hasn't got things worked out yet.

amatamari© said...

Nice pictures, I do not know which to choose!

p.s.
Potrebbe essere una specie che abita nell'Africa - l'immagine sembrava più o meno uguale - ma forse e' piu' credibile sia un piccolo!
:-)

R.Ferrari said...

bela sequencia de fotos. voce tem bonitas fotos em seu blog. parabens.

Richard said...

First year hering gull. They become white at 3 years old age.

Daily Chicago Photo said...

Hey these photos are great - gulls are difficult to get in flight (the big Caspian terns that I took that you commented on coast and hover a little more - making them a little easier to track).

I do agree with your advice about taking 1000 pictures and deleting the blurry ones and the ones of the pigeons. However, you left out the part about deleting the pictures of the blank blue sky ;)

As for the gull. Hard to say. Pretty confident it's a first year. Could be a Herring Gull or a Lesser Black-backed Gull.