146 BULLETIN 113, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



LARUS CAN US Linnaeus. 

 MEW GULL. 



HABITS. 



Contributed by Charles Wendell Townsend. 



This gull, also called sea-mew or common gull, is a native of north- 

 ern Europe and Asia, and is given a doubtful place in the Check 

 List of the American Ornithologists' Union by the statement that 

 it is "accidental in Labrador (?)". In Birds of Labrador, by 

 Townsend and Allen (1907), the whole matter was carefully investi- 

 gated, and as no new light has been thrown, it seems worth while 

 to quote the results here : 



The following is from Audubon's Labrador " Journal," under date of June 

 18, 1S33. "John & Co. found an island (near Little Mecattina) with upwards 

 of 200 nests of the Larus canus, all with eggs, but not a young hatched. The 

 nests were placed on the bare rock; formed of seaweed, about 6 inches in 

 diameter within and a foot without ; some were much thicker and larger than 

 others; in many instances only a foot apart, in others a greater distance was 

 found. The eggs are much smaller than those of Larus marinus." Elliott 

 Coues adds the following note after Larus cabins: " Common gull. — This record 

 raises an interesting question, which can hardly be settled satisfactorily. 

 Larus canus, the common gull of Europe, is given by various authors in 

 Audubon's time, besides himself, as a bird of the Atlantic Coast of North 

 America, from Labrador southward. But it is not known as such to ornith- 

 ologists of the present day." In his Notes on the Ornithology of Labrador 

 (in Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1861, p. 246) Dr. Coues gives L. delawarensis, 

 the ring-billed gull, three speciments of which he procured at Henley Harbor, 

 August 21, 1860. These were birds of the year, and one of them, afterwards 

 sent to England, was identified by Mr. Howard Saunders as L. canus (P. Z. 

 S., 1877, p. 178; Cat. B. Brit. Mus., XXV, 1896, p. 281). This would seem to 

 bear out Audubon's Journal ; but the " common American gull " of his published 

 works is the one he calls L. sonorhynchus (i. e., L. delatcarensis) ; and on 

 page 155 of the Birds of Am., Svo ed., he gives the very incident here nar- 

 rated in his journal as pertaining to the latter species. The probabilities are 

 that, notwithstanding Dr. Coues's finding of the supposed L. canus in Labra- 

 dor, the whole Audubonian record really belongs to L. delaivarensis. 



The mew gull, although conunon during the migrations on the 

 English coasts, does not breed south of the Scottish border, according 

 to Saunders (1889), who says that its trivial name, "common gull," 

 has led to man}'- errors. In Scotland, the Hebrides, Orkneys, and 

 Shetland it breeds in abundance, and a few breeding haunts are to 

 be found in Ireland. It also breeds in Norway and Sweden and 

 northern Kussia and Siberia. In winter, according to Saunders 

 (1889), "it occurs on the shores, lakes, and rivers of the rest of 

 Europe down to the Mediterranean ; also on the African side of the 

 latter as far as the Suez Canal." 



