384 THE BIRDS OF DEVON. 



might be seen on fields some miles inland, searching the ground in com- 

 pany with Rooks, Starlings, and Common Gulls. The old birds sometimes 

 assume their breediug-plumage with the dark cap very earh' in the year. 

 We have one, shot out of a flock in a ploughed field at the end of January, 

 near Barnstaple, which is in complete nuptial dress. Great numbers of 

 these Elack-lieaded Gulls flock into the bay at Weston-super-Mare in 

 company with the other Gulls after the sprats, and many are trapped. 

 Mr. Cecil Smith had a very pretty flock of over a dozen, which he 

 received from this watering-place, and it was an interesting sight to see 

 them running about on his lawn and to watch the changes in their 

 plumage. Col. Montagu states that he used to see this Gull in full 

 plumage on the Devonshire coast in the beginning of July, and these 

 were birds which probably belonged to the small " Gulleries "' in the 

 adjoining county of Dorset. The Colonel communicated a paper to the 

 ' Transactions of the Linuean Society,' in which he traced this species 

 through all its changes, from the nestling to the adult i>lumage, in order 

 to prove that various other so-called species of Gull were only forms of it 

 at dilferent ages. 



Mr. llodd considers the Elack-headed Gull the commonest of all the 

 Gulls to be seen on the Cornish coast during the winttT, and says that a 

 few are to be noticed all through the year, and that some formerly nested 

 on the Scilly Islands. In Dorsetshire, according to Mr. Mansel-PleydeU, 

 it is increasing greatly in numbers every year as a nesting species, owing 

 to the Sea Eirds' Preservation Act. 



The adults in their winter plumage have white heads, but always with 

 a small black patch behind the ear ; the same thing may be said of 

 the winter plumage of adult Little Gulls, audit is probably a characteristic 

 of the winter plumage of all the Black-headed Gulls. 



There is not a more beautiful object in nature than an adult Black- 

 headed Gull in its full breeding-plumage in early spring. The breast is 

 suttused with a delicate rosy blush, which unfortunately soon fades after 

 death, and the contrast of the blood-red bill, eyelids, legs and feet, the dark 

 hood, and the snowy white and delicate grey of the rest of the plumage 

 is truly exquisite, and fills one with regret that these evanescent charms 

 cannot be preserved in all their pristine perfection. The distinctive mark 

 of the species is that the central portion of the outer primaries is aliuaijs 

 wh ite. 



These Gulls nest in gi-eat communities on the fens, merely trampling 

 the grass or rushes with their feet to form a depression in which to lay 

 their eggs, and the young birds are taken and sold for the table, and are 

 considered very good eating. The largest " Guilery " in England is the 

 one at Scoulton Mere in the centre of the county of Xorfolk, which forms 

 the subject of the frontis])iece (from a drawing by Mr. Wolf) to the third 

 volume of the ' Birds of Norfolk.' Prom nine to ten thousand eggs are 

 there taken annually, and are accounted great delicacies, being eaten cold 

 like Plovers' eggs. Mr. Dresser states that Avhere there are trees and 

 bushes near their breeding-stations these Gulls commonly perch upon 

 them. 



