COMMON GULL 143 



sandbanks for repose. Nevertheless, they frequently resort to newly 

 ploughed land in the neighbourhood of the shore, while in bad weather, 

 and more especially in winter, flocks of them may be seen far inland, 

 either hunting over lakes or rivers, or following the plough in search 

 of worms and grubs. While on the wing they continually utter 

 the wild plaintive cries from which they derive their name of sea- 

 mews. Although terns catch live fish, gulls feed chiefly on dead fish 

 and garbage when at sea, while skuas are predatory birds subsisting 

 on flesh. 



The family LaridiK, which includes both gulls and terns, as distinct 

 from the skuas, is characterised by the absence of a bare waxy band 

 (the " cere ") at the base of the beak, the moderately curved and 

 comparatively blunt claws, the rudimentary condition of the pair of 

 blind appendages (" c^eca ") to the intestine, and the presence of two 

 notches on each side of the lower or hind border of the breast-bone 

 or sternum. From the terns, the gulls, which constitute the sub- 

 family Larinse, are distinguished by having the upper half of the 

 stout, moderately long, compressed, and curved beak longer than the 

 lower, over the tip of which it is usually bent down. The oblong 

 nostrils are situated some distance in advance of the base of the beak ; 

 the shank, or lower segment of the leg, has transverse shield-like scales 

 on its front surface ; the hind-toe is small (wanting in one genus) ; and 

 the wings, which when closed extend beyond the tail, have the first 

 primary quill the longest. Many of the species are migratory. The 

 gulls, included in the typical genus Larus, of which there are something 

 like forty species, with a collectively almost cosmopolitan distribution, 

 in addition to the above-mentioned characteristics of the subfamily, have 

 squared tails. 



The common gull is the smallest of the British species of Lams 

 which have no black on either the head or the back ; the males measuring 

 only about 18 inches in length, with a wing-length of under 14 inches. 

 It is an Old World species, ranging from western Europe, inclusive 

 of Iceland (where, however, it is rare), eastwards along the northern 

 coast of Europe and Asia to Kamchatka, Japan, and China ; its 

 breeding-range extending about as far south as 53 X. lat., that is 

 to say, the latitude of Ireland, and as far north in Europe as the 

 North Cape (within the Arctic Circle), and in the Petchora and Yenisei 

 valleys at least to lat. 66'. In winter it forsakes its extreme northern 

 limits to visit the shores of the Mediterranean, the Nile valley, Persian 

 Gulf, and elsewhere ; and it is at this season that it is most abundant 

 on the southern coasts of England, which in summer are deserted by 



