682 



GULL. 



extent, because much more food is left for them there 

 than where the shores arc abrupt and precipitous. 

 They also throng about the fishing villages, where 

 there is usually a great deal of garbage, and where in 

 consequence the common gulls are scarcely less fa- 

 miliar than poultry are in the inland villages. It 

 appears also that they know instinctively where there 

 is food for them on the land as well as where food is 

 most abundant for them at sea ; for though the times 

 when they leave the shores en masse are understood 

 to be those immediately preceding storms, yet they 



Common Gull. 



visit the fields at other times when bad weather cer- 

 tainly does not follo\v their appearance. They are 

 tamed without much difficulty if supplied with plenty 

 of food, which indeed is the case with all rapacious 

 birds. In places near the sea tame ones are very 

 useful in gardens, which they clear of slugs, worms, 

 and other destructive little animals, very successfully ; 

 and in such places they will pay their regular visits 

 to the sea, and return of their own accord. On 

 emergency they can be made to eat grain ; but that 

 is not a favourite food with them. As is the habit of 

 all gulls, they disgorge the contents of their stomachs 

 when alarmed, and if the alarm is soon over they re- 

 swallow. Whether this arises from the attacks made 

 on them by the skuas it is impossible to say, because 

 there are many sea birds which the skuas do not as- 

 sail that have this habit. The petrels, for instance, 

 always discharge a quantity of oil from their stomachs 

 when thej' alight on a ship, or get into any other un- 

 usual situation. The flesh of these birds is not re- 

 lished by most people ; though some of those who 

 reside near the sea consider it as not unpalatable 

 after having been buried for four and twenty hours in 

 fresh mould and then washed with vinegar. 



KITTIWAKE GULL (L. tridactylus). This species 

 is about the size of a pigeon ; fifteen inches in length, 

 about three feet in breadth, and more than half a 

 pound in weight. The adults in their winter plumage 

 have the upper parts bluish ash ; the cheeks finely 

 striated with black ; the exterior quills bordered and 

 terminated with the same ; some black on the other 

 quills ; and all the rest of the body white. The bill 

 is greenish yellow, and the feet olive brown. The 

 leading character is the absence of a hind toe, in the 

 place of which there is a mere clawless tubercle. 

 The manners of these birds are peculiar. During the 

 winter season they quit the shores, and are understood 

 to disperse themselves over the northern seas, where 

 their chief place of repose is on the ice. In spring 

 they return in vast crowds to the rocky shores, where 

 they breed in society, and literally encumber the air 



with the multitude of their wings. On the cliffy 

 parts of the east coast of Britain they are exceedingly 

 numerous, so much so that any number either of the 

 young ones or the old ones may be caught. They 

 often sit so thick upon the rocks as to make these 

 appear from a distance as if covered with snow. 

 Their eggs are sought after with some avidity. They 

 form nests constructed of coarse vegetable rubbish. 

 The eggs are deposited in June, of a dingy greenish 

 or whitish colour, marked with ash-coloured spots. 

 When the young have left the nests, but are unable 

 to fly, the shooting of them is a favourite sport in 

 places where they are abundant. It is said of them, 

 as it is of smoke-dried gannets, that they serve as a 

 whet to the appetite ; but an epicure who despatched 

 a dozen upon one occasion, declared that he had no 

 more -appetite when he left off than when he began. 

 They are more gentle in their manners, and as it is 

 said more cleanly in their habits, than several of the 

 other gulls, and instances have been known of their 

 being tamed and evincing considerable affection for 

 their masters. As they are among the most elevated 

 breeders of all the gulls that frequent our shores, as 

 their breeding rocks are usually of the most sublime 

 description, and as the birds themselves are very nu- 

 merous and by no means unhandsome, they are 

 worthy of being studied with considerable attention. 



THE SILVERY GULL (L. argentatus] is also called 

 the herring gull. It has the feet of a pale flesh-colour ; 

 the irides and bill yellow, the latter with an orange 

 spot on the angle. The upper part is bluish ash 

 colour, and the quills dusky with black tips and 

 some white spots on the back ; the sexes are alike ; 

 the young have the bill of a horn colour, and the 

 plumage mottled. The quills, in this young state, 

 are dusky, without any black on the tips, or any 

 white spots ; and this plumage continues with very 

 little alteration till the autumn of the second year. 

 At that time, the feet acquire a reddish tint, and the 

 bill becomes yellowish, the white is a little more pure, 

 and the moldings more of an ash colour. The dusky 

 hue which, in the first plumage, marks the end of the 

 tail, also begins to break with white at this moult. 

 In the third autumn, the entire ash colour, and white, 

 with the black on the tips of the quills, the white 

 spots, the flesh-coloured feet, the yellow bill, and the 

 straw-coloured eyes, are acquired, after which there 

 is no farther change in the plumage. In the spring 

 of each year, while the bird is advancing to maturity, 

 there is some change in the plumage, but it is very 

 slight, thereby proving that though the gulls do moult 

 twice in the year, the grand moult is the autumnal 

 one. 



In all their plumages these gulls resort to the 

 breeding grounds in the season ; and as they do riot 

 congregate on those grounds at any other time of the 

 year, there is little doubt that they breed before they 

 assume the adult plumage. This is not uncommon 

 among several genera of aquatic birds ; and it used 

 to be considered as a conclusive argument that the 

 young and old were of different species. These birds 

 are very abundant and very generally distributed 

 over the shores, not only of the seas, but occasion- 

 ally of the inland lakes. The greater number breed 

 in the north, and form large nests of dry herbage on 

 the ledges of the rocks. In the Orkney and Shet- 

 land islands their nests" are exceedingly numerous ; 

 and when the herring fishing sets in they are such con- 

 stant and such numerous attendants, ready to snatch 



