THE RING-BILLED GULL, 



[Larus delawarensis) 



Oh, had I but thy wings when storms arise, 



Gray spirit of the sea and of the shore ! 



When the wild waters round thee rave and roar, 

 Calm art thou 'neath the tumult of the skies. 



—Lloyd Mifflin, "The Sea-Gull. 



Mr. Burroughs says: "To strong, 

 sus,ceptible characters, the music of na- 

 ture is not confined to sweet sounds." 

 In another place he says that, "the wild 

 crooning of the flocks of gulls, repeated, 

 continued by the hour, swirling sharp 

 and shrill, rising and falling Hke the 

 wind in a storm, as they circle above the 

 beach or dip to the dash of the waves, — 

 are much more welcome in certain 

 moods than any and all mere bird-mel- 

 odies, in keeping as they are with the 

 shaggy and untamed features of ocean 

 and woods." Then, too, there is the 

 poetry of motion in the graceful flight 

 of the Gulls. Either flying, swimming, 

 or resting upon the water a flock of 

 these Gulls is a beautiful picture. The 

 Ring-billed Gull and the American her- 

 ring gull are the most common of the 

 gulls of eastern North America. These 

 two gulls resemble each other and are 

 not easily distinguished unless they are 

 seen in the same flock. The herring gull 

 is the larger of the two, and the black 

 ring upon the bill of the bird which we 

 illustrate is a sufficiently marked char- 

 acteristic to identify it. Both species 

 often fly high in the air as if for no other 

 purpose than the pleasure they find in 

 the act. That such a supposition is an 

 error is soon demonstrated when one of 

 their number suddenly drops to the sur- 

 face of the water to seize a morsel of 

 food which its sharp eyes have discov- 

 ered. 



The Ring-billed Gulls range over 

 North America at large, though tliey are 

 more common in the interior. They 

 breed from the northern tier of the 

 United States, northward, and they win- 

 ter from about the southern border of 

 their breeding range southward to Cuba 

 and Mexico. They nest in colot\ii>s con- 



sisting of countless numbers, frequently 

 so close together that they hardly seem 

 to have wing-room. Regarding the nest- 

 ing of these Gulls on an island about an 

 acre in extent, in Devil's Lake, Dakota, 

 an observer says: 'T don't suppose you 

 could lay down a two-foot rule anywhere 

 without each end of it striking a nest. 

 It was common to find the terns and 

 Gulls breeding side by side. Most of 

 the Gulls' nests were in the grass, while 

 those of the terns were in the sand." 



The nests of the Ring-billed Gulls 

 vary with the localities in which they 

 are built. They are usually made of a 

 mass of grass or seaweeds when these 

 materials are plentiful, but when these 

 substances are not obtainable in large 

 quantities the nests are very scantily 

 supplied. 



These Gulls may be considered among 

 the scavengers which help to keep the 

 shores of bodies of water free from put- 

 rifying organic matter. Their appetites 

 seem almost insatiable and it is said that 

 they will take any food, be it fresh or 

 putrid, which is not too hard or too 

 large for them to swallow. They are 

 also very fond of fish which they are 

 very expert at catching. They will fol- 

 low schools of fish in rivers which they 

 keenly watch, until a fish leaps from the 

 water, in its efforts to catch an insect, 

 when they quickly dart down and seize 

 it. Inland these Gulls also feed upon 

 insects which they catch either upon the 

 wing or upjDn the ground. It is said 

 that, in some localities, they destroy 

 large numbers of grasshoppers. Dur- 

 ing the first few days of the life of the 

 young, they are fed with partially di- 

 gested food raised from the parents* 

 crop. After that tliev arc fed with the 

 ilcsh of fish. 



