A rare ivory gull and a rude, misogynistic birder

I wanted to have another try at photographing the ivory gull, so got up really early (mum was already up of course, so it wasn't tricky to organise!) and headed to Patrington Haven. As it was a mile's walk from the car park to the river I decided to cycle as I had limited time before I needed to go for a hospital appointment.

About 100 yards from the shore I got off the bike and pushed it the last bit, past a huge puddle. When I joined the group of birders there, rather than a 'Hello' or a bird update, my greeting was a rather angry "If you'd arrived on that bike 15 minutes earlier, you'd have flushed that gull"

I always lack confidence in my indignation, so I mulled it over for five minutes, then approached him and said if I'd arrived 15 minutes earlier and found a group of birders looking in the same direction, I would hardly be likely to cycle between the birders and the bird, would I? We ended up having a rather heated exchange - eventually his mate told him to "Give it up mate - you'll never win against that. Bloody women - all the bloody same. I'm moving before I do something I regret'

!!!

WTF, as they say? Being vilified for something I hadn't done, nor was likely to do?

What an arse (pardon me - but it's my blog - and he WAS an arse!)

Anyhoo - here is the gull - very rare in this country and only here because - presumably - it's been blown thousands of miles off course.

It has lovely simple wing markings, though I don't have a great shot of that.

Here it is eating something dead and rotting!

I've just noticed that there is a rather odd pink protrusion between its legs and none of the birdy experts I have asked know what it is - though guesses range from undigested squid being excreted, to a cloacal prolapse - all ideas welcomed! It apparently isn't the 'obvious' ;-)