BLACK-HEADED GULL 



5D 



with grey. Young birds resemble herring-gulls of the same age, but 

 are darker above, with black primaries, horn-coloured beaks, brown 

 eyes, and dark brown legs. The chick in down cannot be distinguished 

 from the herring-gull at the same period of its existence. 



With the black-headed gull we come to a group of 

 species characterised by the brown or black head of 

 the adult in summ^er-dress, the group being repre- 

 sented in Great Britain only by this and a second 



indigenous species, although stragglers of others have been recorded. 



The black-headed, or, as it is often more appropriateh' called, the 



Blaek-headed Gull 



(Larus ridi- 



bundus). 



MOUNTED IN THE ROWLAND WARD STUDtOb 



BLACK-HEADED GULL (SUMMER). 



laughing gull (since the head is usually chocolate-coloured), is a species 

 breeding in temperate rather than Arctic climates, its breeding-range 

 extending from the Faroes in the west across southern Scandinavia 

 and Russia southwards of Archangel to the Mediterranean in the 

 south, and thence eastwards across temperate Asia to Kamchatka. 

 In winter these gulls visit Africa, the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf, Upper 

 India, and so on to the Philippines. It is one of the commonest of 

 the British gulls, and nests in suitable localities throughout the British 

 Islands, inclusive of the Shetlands. Marsh}^ localities, frequently a 

 considerable distance from the sea, form its breeding-haunts, and in 

 these it nests in large colonies which may include thousands of indi- 

 viduals. The inland British " gulleries," now much less numerous than 

 formerly, such as those of Scoulton in Norfolk, Poole in Dorsetshire, 



