All species › Waders, gulls and terns › Gulls and terns

Gulls and terns | Laridae

Meeuwen en sterns | Gaviotas y charranes

Three fully webbed front toes and a small, raised hind toe: these birds can rest on the water, and salt glands above the eyes let them drink sea water as well. Two builds stand side by side within the family: heavier birds with a stout, slightly hooked bill that will eat almost anything they can get hold of, and slighter birds with a thin, pointed bill held downwards while hovering, before they drop into the water. They nest almost always in ground colonies, with one to three blotched eggs; the downy chicks stay at the nest and are fed by both parents, unlike the self-feeding young of the waders. Most species moult twice a year and show a different head pattern in winter, and in the largest species it takes two to four years before the adult plumage is complete.

Native species 35 species

Species that occur here by nature: breeding birds, winter visitors and passage migrants. They are arranged by genus, in the sequence of the list.

Gulls | Larinae

18 species

Heavily built birds with broad, rounded wingtips and a stout bill that hooks slightly downwards at the front: not a probe for pushing into mud but a pair of pincers that can deal with almost anything — a crab, a fish, refuse, an egg or a chick. Fairly long legs let them walk easily and they sit high on the water, so you meet them on a ploughed field as readily as at sea. Where terns drop from a height, a gull picks from the surface while swimming, or chases another bird until it gives up its catch. Many wear a dark hood in summer that shrinks to a smudge behind the eye in winter, and the largest need two to four years of brown mottled dress before the clean grey and white is complete.

Hydrocoloeus 1 species

Little gull
Hydrocoloeus minutus
- Surface standing waters
- Sublittoral sediment
- Sedge and reedbeds without free-standing water
- Littoral sediment

Rissa 1 species

Black-legged kittiwake
Rissa tridactyla
- Pelagic water column
- Rock cliffs, ledges and shores
- Buildings of cities, towns and villages
VU

Xema 1 species

Sabine's gull
Xema sabini
- Pelagic water column
- Tundra
- Surface standing waters

Pagophila 1 species

Ivory gull
Pagophila eburnea
- Ice-associated marine habitats
- Rock cliffs, ledges and shores
- Snow or ice-dominated habitats
NT

Chroicocephalus 2 species

Ichthyaetus 3 species

Larus 9 species

Terns | Sterninae

12 species

Slender, lightly built birds with long narrow wings and, in most, a forked tail, giving a buoyant, bounding flight quite unlike the steady sailing of the gulls. The bill is thin, straight and drawn out to a needle point; the legs are short, so they stand about on a beach but hardly walk on it. The hunting method is the mark of the group: they hang hovering over the water with the bill pointed down, then close the wings and plunge. The marsh-living species do not dive at all, but pick insects from the surface in dipping flight. Nearly all wear a black cap in the breeding season that fades to a white forehead in winter, and they nest in colonies on sand, shingle or floating vegetation.

Onychoprion 2 species