LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN GULLS AND TERNS. 97 



pinions, as if enjoying the exercise. Wliile soaring it occasionally 

 preens the feathers of its breast with its bill or raises one foot to 

 scratch its head, without losing its poise. Once, while sailing before 

 a strong wind, almost a gale, a lot of these gulls were following us 

 to pick scraps of food which we were throwing overboard; it was 

 necessary for them to face the wind and drift along tail foremost, so 

 as to keep pace with our boat ; they were not sailing or drifting, but 

 were maintaining their positions by constant flapping and were ap- 

 parently flying backwards. While flying the feet are extended back- 

 wards and buried in the plumage, but when about to alight they are 

 dropped and spread. A sudden descent from a considerable height 

 is quickly accomplished by a spiral or a zigzag glide, on half ex- 

 tended wings, with frequent quick tipping from side to side. 



The cries and call notes of this gull are much like those of other 

 species. Mr. Charles A. Keeler (1892) has given a good descrip- 

 tion of them, as follows : 



Their most common note may be expressed by the syllables quock kuck kuck 

 fcwofc, uttered very rapidly in a low, guttural tone. Sometimes it was varied 

 thus kuck kuck kuck ka, the quality of tone being the same as in the first 

 instance. Frequently a higher cry would be heard, which may be indicated by 

 the letters ki aa, with a strong accent on the first syllalde. Again, one would 

 utter a rattling, guttural cry, whicli soimded like a man being throttled. 



The behavior of western gulls toward their neighbors is truly 

 scandalous. They must be cordially hated and seriously dreaded by 

 the various species among which they nest, for they are arrant 

 thieves, ever on the alert to improve every opportunity to steal and 

 devour any unprotected eggs or young which they can find. They 

 usually select a breeding place among nesting colonies of cormorants, 

 murres, or pelicans, chiefly because they can there find an abundant 

 food supply in the nests of their peaceful neighbors. Cormorants, 

 being rather shy, are easily driven from their nests by human in- 

 truders and do not readily return, so that the gulls often succeed in 

 cleaning out a whole colony. Eternal vigilance is the price of suc- 

 cess in rearing a brood with such rogues roaming about and looking 

 for the slightest chance. The cormorants and pelicans have to sit 

 on their eggs constantly from the day they are laid, or the gulls will 

 get them. This will account for the fact that the young in the nests 

 of these species are often of widely differently ages. Even the young 

 have to be constantly brooded, for the gulls will swallow the smallest 

 young whole and mutilate or beat to death the larger ones. Mr. 

 A. W. Anthony (1906) has graphically described this perforance as 

 follows : 



The advent of man in the region of a cormorant rookery is hailed with de- 

 light by every gull on the island, but to the poor cormorant it is a calamity of 

 the darkest hue. As the frighton(>d birds leave the nests, vi^hich have so far 

 never been for a moment left without the protection of at least one of the 



