Yellow Legged Gulls

As we were departing a Greek port, my ship was surrounded by hundreds of gulls. They were trying to catch fish, which were pushed up by the ships wake. Most of the Gulls were these Yellow Legged Gulls (Larus michahellis) and found it a great opportunity to photograph these flying beauties.
Will feature 3 more photographs in the next post too.These birds were formerly considered a part of the Herring gull family and they do look similar to Herring Gulls. Adults have darker grey backs and wings than herring gulls and have more black in the wing tips than herring gulls.

Heuglin's Gull - Juvenile

Photographed about 1000Kms off East African coast was this Juvenile Gull, probably Heuglin's Gull. It stayed on board for about one hour. Since I did not see it indulge in fishing may be it was migrating and must have decided to take a break enroute.
The first photograph actually makes a good wallpaper.

Gull Airborne

Photographed off Gujarat coast, two airborne Gulls, not very sharp images, but the best I could manage, in early morning light. The reddish cast on the birds plumage is because of the red rising sun.

Black headed Gull

Black headed gull in breeding plumage.These brave birds let me photograph them in all possible places,from the water level all the way up to the ships mast. These gull probably like a certain amount of personal space around them. Like in the fourth photograph, the gull with the open beak is quite irritated when another gull tried to land too close to it.

Gull

Sea gulls in meditation, photographed them sitting on the foremost davit of my ship. I was not able to identify exactly which species of Gull these were. Any help with the identification will be greatly appreciated. These were photographed in the Persian Gulf.

Herring Gulls

Photographed these Herring gulls in the Persian Gulf. Unlike a lake, its rare that a sea is calm enough to get reflections photographed. Used a 2.5x telephotolens and UV filter.

Gull and the Anchor Cable

A Lesser black backed Gull, flies across a anchor cable of my ship. I was photographing the Gull standing below the anchor cable, when I saw the beautiful contrast between the Red shackle and the blue sky. Set my tripod to incorporate the cable, set to manual focus and focused on the cable and waited for a bird to flyby. Once the gull obliged, I went on clicking till he went out of frame.
f/8 , 1/200sec,

Lesser Black Backed Gull

Photographed at the Persian Gulf. These birds follow ships and pick fish brought up by the ship's wake hence their movement is relatively steady with respect to the ship. When the bird is in the right position with respect to the sun, it provides a wonderful opportunity to photograph them. The first two photographs were clicked when my ship was at anchor and I was practicing panning the camera. The tight fit framing of the third picture was purely accidental, since its hard to get the framing right when you photograph flying birds. I must have clicked about 50 -60 photographs of this bird, to get the right framing. Patience and persistence pays.
All the while I kept the camera mode on aperture priority and let the camera decide the shutter speed. Metering on center weighed average, assuming that the bird will be at the center of the frame, and shooting at continuous frames.

Black Headed Gull

We were anchored off Fujairah, and these gulls after a long day of fishing used the railings of the ship as a place to hangout. The birds here are non-breeding adults and spend this time socializing with each other. Probably, nothing interests a gull more than the small ritualistic display of other gulls, before they can perch themselves; maybe the gull way of saying 'Hi'. During the breeding season, the head of the bird gets a darker shade.
As long as I didn't make any sudden movement, these birds let me come close to them. Some of them were not even bothered by my presence or the camera tripod.