GULLS AND TERNS: LAUGHING GULL 
291 
Additional Literature.—Palmer, R. H., Condor, XVIII, 115 122, 1916. 
Seton-Thompson, Ernest, Bird-Lore, 186, 1901. 
LAUGHING GULL: Laras atricilla Linnaeus 
Description. — Length: 15-17 inches, wing 13, tail 5, bill 1.7, tarsus 2. Adults in 
summer plumage: Hood sooty gray, eyelid with white spot; mantle slaty gray; older wing 
quills black , with or without small white apical spot; tail white; underparts white, 
breast flushed with pink in spring; iris brown, naked orbital ring and bill, dark red; 
bill with dusky tip or indistinct band; legs and feet dark reddish brown. AduUs in 
winter plumage: Forepart and sides of head white, back of head spotted or mottled with 
brownish gray; bright colors of bill and feet obscured. Young in juvenal plumage: 
Upperparts light brownish, especially about the head, without sharply contrasting 
white; feather edgings buffy or clay-color; wing quills black, tipped with white; tail 
grayish with wide black band and white tip. 
Comparisons. —The Franklin and Laughing Gull are similar and the young might 
be confused, but atricilla is uniformly browner, especially about the head, which 
lacks the sharp contrasts of the dark half hood and light face of pepixcan. The tail 
band in atricilla is also narrower than in pepixcan, and in atricilla both adults and 
immature have the ends of the wings extensively black. 
Range.— Breeds on the Atlantic coast of the United States and the coasts and 
islands of the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea; winters from the coast of South 
Carolina to the northern coast of Brazil and the western coast of South America 
south to Chile. Casual inland in Canada and the United States as far west as Colo¬ 
rado and New Mexico (Dwight); recorded from Nova Scotia, after an “exceptional 
storm” (Taverner, 1927). 
State Records. —An inhabitant of tropical and temperate coasts, the Laughing 
Gull occasionally strays far inland. Such a wanderer examined by Coues in June, 
1864, was taken at Fort Wingate, he says, “many miles from the nearest water of 
consequence”; though he adds, “it must have come up the Rio Grande” (Birds of 
the Northwest, 1874, 651).—W. W. Cooke. 
General Habits. —Nesting colonies of Laughing Gulls were 
formerly to be found along the salt marshes of the Atlantic coast from 
New England southward, but owing to persecution from eggers and 
plume hunters comparatively few colonies remain. All gulls and 
terns are protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and in most 
States they are protected by State laws, but the danger has been so 
great that some of the most notable breeding colonies have also been 
protected by wardens of the National Association of Audubon Societies. 
Additional Literature.—Dwight, Jonathan, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 
LII, Art. Ill, 262-267, 1925 (plumage, molts, distribution, etc.).— Mackay, G. H., 
Auk, X, 333-336, 1893 (habits in Massachusetts). 
FRANKLIN GULL: Larus pepixcan Wagler 
Description. — Length: 13.5-15 inches, wing 11.2, bill 1.3, tarsus 1.6. Adults in 
summer plumage: Hood slaty black, eyelid with white patch, neck white, mantle dark 
slaty; wing quills gray, tipped with white, the five outer ones with black subterminal 
spaces; tail white, underparts white, deeply tinted with pink in spring; iris brown, 
bill deep red, naked orbital ring , legs and feet dark red. Adults in winter' plumage: 
Head mainly white but sides with contrasting dark patch and back of head streaked 
