The Gulls. 
201 
occasionally visits our shores in some 
numbers, and occurs nearly every 
autumn and winter. It breeds on the 
lakes of Northern and Central Russia, 
the nest being on the marshy ground, 
and composed of leaves, grass and 
sedge. The eggs are three or four 
in number, and are like those of the 
Common Tern : they measure from 
an inch-and-a-half to an inch-and- 
three-quarters in length. 
This 1 a r jr e 
THE GREAT 
BLACK-HEADED 
GULL. 
(Lams ichthyaetus.) 
See p. 202. 
Gull, which 
measures about 
two - and - a - half 
feet in length, is 
easily distin- 
guished by its size from all the other 
Hooded Gulls. It is an inhabitant 
of South-eastern Russia and Central 
Asia, and a summer-plumaged indi- 
vidual was shot near Exmouth in 
May or June, 1859. The changes of 
plumage are similar to those under- 
gone by the smaller Hooded Gulls. 
The bright 
THE 
MEDITERRANEAN 
BLACK-HEADED 
GULL. 
(Lams melanocephalus. 
See p. 202. 
The Little Gull. 
Bonaparte’s Gull. 
coral-red bill 
of this species, contrasting with the black head, distinguishes 
it from the allied Hooded Gulls. The back is light pearly 
grey. The young birds may be told by the black on 
both sides of the shaft of the second and third primary. 
The species inhabits the countries of the Mediterranean and 
the Black Sea, and has twice been shot in England, once on Breydon Broad, near 
Yarmouth, and once at Barking; both specimens occurred in winter. 
This North-American species has been noted about half a 
dozen times in Great Britain, specimens having been shot in 
Ireland and Scotland as well as in England. It has a black 
bill, and the hood is of a leaden black, and in the young birds 
there is no black on the inner margin of the shaft of the third primary, and very 
little on the inner web of the first and second. Bonaparte’s Gull breeds in colonies 
on the lakes of the interior of North America and makes a nest of sticks in a tree. 
BONAPARTE’S 
GULL. 
(Lams Philadelphia.) 
