Uncommon but regular on the coast in Senegambia. This hulking first-year bird
was present with Slender-billed, Gray-headed and Lesser Black-backed
Gulls on Tanji Beach. By all accounts, the racial identification of the birds occuring
in The Gambia seems to be a little cloudy, and this bird certainly
looks quite different to the references that I could find for young
South American Kelp Gulls (L. dominicanus dominicanus). It's generally assumed that the Senegambian birds are closest to the South African form L.d.ventula (Cape Gull) but the rangy, hulking jizz of this immature has left me wondering about the isolation of the Senegambian birds and whether or not they might be distinct from vetula. Several adults were present at the same site.
Update: Dec '06 - Thanks to information received from Clive Barlow, it appears that Didier Vangeluwe has been banding Senegambian Kelp Gulls or several years, and "has collected biological material from all ringed birds for mtDNA sequencing from the Saloum population and reports that laboratory work is pending on funds being found". Naturally, the results of this lab work will be of great interest to many.
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