The Glaucous Gull 



interesting sight to watch a large flock passing over calm water in this 

 manner. They are limited strictly to tide-water and rarely ascend even 

 the Yukon delta over a few miles. 



"Throughout its range this species has considerable curiosity and 

 comes circling about any strange intruder to its haunts. In the bay at 

 Saint Michaels they were frequently seen following a school of white 

 whales, evidently to secure such fragments of fish or other food as the 

 whales dropped in the water. It is curious to note how well the birds 

 timed the whales and anticipated their appearance as the latter came 

 up to blow." 



Dr. Joseph Grinnell found the Pacific Kittiwake breeding extensively 

 on Chamisso Island in Kotzebue Sound, and he says': "On July 9th (1899) 

 the eggs were well advanced in incubation. I saw no nests containing 

 more than two eggs, and many nests held but one. The nests consisted of 

 a wet, muddy mass of decaying grasses, adhering to narrow ledges and 

 projecting points of rocks, frequently so limited in extent as to make it 

 appear as though the nest were stuck to the face of the cliff like a Barn 

 Swallow's. The neatly-moulded saucer-shaped nest-cavity was lined 

 with grasses. As I was let slowly down the face of the cliff at the end of a 

 rope, the sitting Kittiwakes beneath me would allow me to approach very 

 closely before launching from the nests. They would leave with a few pe- 

 culiar shrill cries, and hover about me or soar back and forth along the 

 cliff, while the ever circling files and swarms of murres and puffins out over 

 the water, was enough to bewilder one. I found the Kittiwakes' nests built 

 in colonies, that is, there would be as many as a dozen built close together, 

 lined along a narrow ledge." 



No. 271 



Glaucous Gull 



A. O. U. No. 42. Larus hyperboreus Gunnerus. 



Synonyms. — Burgomaster. Point Barrow Gull. 



Description. — Adult in summer: Mantle pale pearl-gray; remaining plumage 

 pure white; primaries entirely white or pale gray basally fading into white on tips, 

 their shafts straw-yellow. Bill chrome yellow with vermilion spot at angle; feet and 

 legs livid flesh-color; iris light hazel. In whiter: Iris golden yellow; bill and feet 

 paler than in summer; head and hind-neck lightly touched with pale brownish gray. 

 Immature: Sordid white, shaded below (most uniformly on belly) with brownish, 

 and slightly mottled above with pale reddish brown; exposed primaries chiefly brownish 

 dusky, narrowly tipped with white; tail brownish dusky terminally (narrowly tipped 



1 Birds of the Kotzebue Sound Region. Pac. Coast Avifauna, No. i, p. 9. 



1363 



