686 



IVORY f;ULL. 



The Ivory Gull has been recorded on one occasion from Iceland, 

 and has been noticed on the coasts of Northern Europe down to the 

 mouth of the Somrae in France, as well as near Lausanne in Switzer- 

 land. In the high northern latitudes it is now known to be com- 

 pletely circumpolar in its range, for the American expeditions to 

 Point Barrow and Bering Sea met with it in those parts, where it had 

 not previously been observed, though already known to be tolerably 

 common on the Siberian coast and the islands to the northward. 

 Almost all the Arctic explorers in America have recorded it ; 

 Richardson found it breeding in long. 122° W. ; Sir Leopold 

 M'Clintock obtained a single egg (now in the Dublin Museum) 

 from a nest on Prince Patrick's Island in 116° W. ; and Col. Feilden 

 saw a pair on a lofty and inaccessible cliff in Smith Sound, on 

 August 1 6th 1 87 5. In Baffin Bay it is plentiful, and adults as well 

 as immature birds are annually obtained in Greenland ; while in 

 winter they wander as far south as New Brunswick. The best 

 known breeding-places are in the Spitsbergen archipelago, especially 

 on Stor-oen, and on Franz Josef Land (Ibis 1898, p. 264), while 

 Admiral Markham found the bird plentiful in the west and north of 

 Novaya Zemlya, and Dr. Nansen's" Expedition met with it in 1894, 

 in lat. 81° N. and long. 130° E. 



The nest, composed of moss, sea-weed and drift, is sometimes on 

 ledges of precipices, but very often on the ground ; the eggs, which 

 are not known to exceed 2 in number, are very similar to those of 

 L. ca/itis, and measure about 2-5 by 17 in. In 'The Ibis,' 1888, 

 pp. 440-443, Prof. R. Collett has given a description of a fine series, 

 with a coloured illustration of two eggs and of a downy nestling ; 

 while Mr, W. S. Bruce has described a colony on Franz Josef Land 

 {oJ>. cit. 1898, pp. 265-267). The food consists largely of marine 

 animals and the droppings of walruses and seals, but the 'krang,' i.e. 

 flensed carcases, of whales &:c., are greedily devoured. Col. Feilden 

 says that this bird has a shrill note, not unlike that of the Arctic Tern, 

 and also that in its flight it resembles a Tern rather than a Gull. 



The adult in summer has the entire plumage white, slightly rosy 

 in life ; the bill greenish-grey at the base and red at the tip ; legs 

 and feet black, the hind-toe strongly developed and connected with 

 the tarsus by a well-defined web. Length of a male 18 in., wing 

 13 in. ; the female being smaller. The young bird is dark grey on the 

 face and chin, and is spotted with black on the back, wing-coverts, 

 tips of the primaries and tail-feathers, as well as on the upper and 

 under tail-coverts. The downy nestling is greyish-white ; the fledge- 

 ling is smoke-grey. 



