Ha, Robski and I cross-posted with the exact same thought.
A couple of other points. This image looks worse than it might because of two things: (1) the gull's plumage is blown out on the throat and head (very difficult not to do this with a brilliant white bird, of course - egrets are always hard work, exposue-wise), and (2) the horizontal surface of the beach is only a little further away than the bird is, so you are in that tricky situation where you can't get the background nice and sharp (not enough DOF is available for that, except maybe at f/16 or f/22), and you can't get the background properly blurred out either (it's not far enough away from the bird at f/5.6, you'd need something like f/2.8 - priced a 400mm f/2.8 lately?).
The reason I mention these two things is that we need to be aware of them before we start drawing conclusions about the image and the lens. By taking note of them, we can mentally discount them (this is supposed to be a test shot, not a competition entry after all) and come to a more balanced view of the image quality, and thus what is going on with your lens.
Having done that, I can only say that something is screwy!
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