- 



336 BIRDS OP NORFOLK. 



Marshland, in company with the black-headed gull, feed- 

 ing on the worms and other dead animal matter left by 

 the subsiding waters. It is almost invariably in flocks 

 more or less numerous, and its graceful flight and pure 

 tints render it one of the most beautiful of the smaller 

 gulls. 



LARUS LEUCOPTERUS, Faber. 

 ICELAND GULL. 



An exceedingly rare bird on the Norfolk coast ; it 

 seems probable that most of the specimens said to have 

 been met with were small and pale-coloured examples of 

 the glaucous gull, a much more common species. 



Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., in his list of Norfolk birds 

 contributed to Mason's history of the county, says, " Mr. 

 Stevenson and I, after numerous enquiries, can only 

 certify one undoubted specimen, viz., a young female, 

 in the possession of Mr. G. Smith, of Yarmouth, which 

 was shot at Caister, near Yarmouth, in November, 

 1874." This specimen was examined by Mr Howard 

 Saunders, who confirmed its identity. All the other 

 recorded specimens have proved on examination to 

 belong to the glaucous gull in one or other stage of 

 plumage. 



The great variation in size to which this " lesser 

 white- winged gull " is subject renders its identification 

 a matter of some difliculty ; hence, probably, the fre- 

 quency with which the larger species (the glaucous gull) 

 has been mistaken for it. 



Colonel Irby (" Key List of British Birds ") gives 

 the length of this species as 22 inches, and that of 

 the glaucous gull 26 to 33 inches, but states that the 

 wings of the smaller species are relatively much longer 

 than those of the glaucous gull, being nearly as long as 

 those of the last named. Schlegel (in " Mus. Pays-Bas, 

 Lari," pp. 4-5) gives the length of the wing in Larus 

 glaucus as from 16 in. 3 lines to 17 in. 3 lines as against 

 from 14 in. to 15 inches 2 lines in L. leucopterus. 



