GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL 433 



GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL. 



Larus marinus, Linnaeus. /S'.A^., i., p. 225 (1766). 

 Cobb; Wagell. 



This fine large species may be considered a resident 

 on the coast of Kent, being found at all times of the 

 j'-ear, in pairs or singly. It is very rarely found inland, 

 never leaving the sea-shore. 



The following note appears in Yarrell's last edition of 

 British Birds, viz. : " Dr. Turner, who wrote on British 

 Ornithology more than three hundred years ago, calls 

 this Gull a " Cob," and by this name it is still known 

 on the flat shores of Kent and Essex, at the mouth of 

 the Thames, where this bird remains all the year. 



Boys, in his Birds of Sandwich, 1792, calls this bird 

 the " Wagell." This name is applied to the full-grown 

 young bird in the mottled plumage. 



On February 8, 190G, during the great snow- and 

 thunderstorm that passed over Kent on that day and 

 did so much damage, Mr. Tims, of Ham Street, on 

 returning along the Eoyal Military Canal in Romney 

 Marsh, and about half-way between Ruckinge and Ham 

 Street, came upon a pair of dead Great Black-backed 

 Gulls lying close together, which was a most unusual 

 instance of these birds being found so far inland. After 

 a careful examination there was no doubt that they had 

 been struck by lightning and killed close together. On 

 the pinion of each bird it appeared as though it had been 

 burnt, the blood-vessels had all been burst, and the 

 contents in a watery condition diffused over the whole 

 of the interior, but nowhere in clots. 

 28 



