The Ministry of Silly Gulls

There is a scene in Monty Python where Graham Chapman, dressed as a General, appears on the screen in order to lambaste the previous sketches for being too silly.

I think it is about time for his character to make a come back, for if I read another post or comment on a birding website relating to the finer points of gull identification I think I’ll go doolally.

Why have so many birders gone gull mad?

It’s not that I have anything against gulls – adults in breeding plumage are handsome birds - but I must confess that after a six month tour of India passed without me seeing a single gull, I wasn’t hankering to get down to my nearest rubbish tip when I returned to Blighty.

Buried in last month’s Birdwatching magazine there was a well overdue article on ‘Intraspecies variation’, highlighting, through the use of various images, how different individuals of the same species can vary.

It was quite illuminating and a timely reminder that not everything can be placed into neat categories. Old olive-munching default monkey Harris Tottle was fanatical in this respect, so anybody out there scrutinising P5 on a 3cy argentatus Herring Gull is in good company.

Personally, I fall into line more with the American poet Walt Whitman:

You must not know too much or be too precise or scientific about birds and trees and flowers and watercraft; a certain free-margin, and even vagueness - ignorance, credulity - helps your enjoyment of these things."

Until later.