Long-tailed Skua (Long-tailed Jaegar) Stercorarius longicaudus

The scarcest of the regularly-occurring skuas in Norfolk with almost all records from the autumn.

Accurate identification of distant skuas requires an extremely large amount of experience and and is often viewed with skepticism by those who don't have that experience. However the best and most experienced seawatchers are able to recognise the different species by subtle jizz and behavioural characteristics. I reckon I'd seen about 50-100 distant Long-tailed Skuas, with the ID of each one talked through with some of the best seawatchers in the country before I was even beginning to be able to identifiy them accurately.

So far I only have photos of one closer bird. Even that was too far for decent photos and I don't think it is really identiable from these poor images.

Long-tailed Skua, Sheringham (Norfolk, UK), 13th September 2009