328 BRITISH BIRDS 



habits are similar to those of the herring and lesser black -backed 

 gulls; but being so much larger and more powerful, it is more 

 injurious to other sea-birds, whose nests it plunders of their eggs or 

 young. It is also more oceanic, straying to a great distance from 

 land in its search for dead animal matter floating on the waxes a 

 veritable ' vulture of the sea.' Its nest is placed, as a rule, on the 

 summit of an inaccessible rock on the coast, or on a small rocky 

 island, and is carelessly formed of seaweed and grass. Two or tin-re 

 eggs are laid, greyish brown, sometimes tinged with olive, with dark 

 brown spots distributed sparingly over the whole surface'. 



Black-headed Gull. 

 Larus ridibundus. 



Bill and feet red ; head and upper part of the neck blackish 

 brown ; mantle grey ; all the rest, white ; the under parts tinged 

 with pink. The black on the head is lost in winter. Length, 

 sixteen inches. 



The black-headed gull, if not the most abundant of its genus, is 

 without doubt the most generally known, on account of its wide 

 diffusion in the country, and of its habit of breeding in inland 

 marshes. It remains throughout the year, most of the time frequent- 

 ing the flat parts of the sea-coast, estuaries, and tidal rivers, where 

 it is seen perpetually roaming up and down in search of the small 

 fishes and crustaceans on which it feeds, and any dead animal 

 matter cast up by the tide. In its winter dress it is almost im- 

 possible to tell this species from the common gull and kittiwake 

 when they are seen together, as in size they are nearly alike, and 

 the buoyant, leisurely flight and circling motions in the air are the 

 same in all. But very early in spring the distinguishing mark and 

 nuptial ornament of a black hood is assumed, after which there 

 can be no mistake. And here I may remark that I differ from 

 Howard Saunders when he says that, as the hood is not black, the 

 bird should be called the brown-headed gull. Vernacular names 

 of this kind are descriptive of the creatures as they appear to us 

 when seen living in a state of nature ; and at a distance of twenty 

 or thirty yaids, which is as close as a flying gull will come to a 

 man, the hood certainly appears to be black. 



In March the gulls withdraw to marshes and meres to breed. 



