James Chubb

No such thing as a seagull

If there’s one group of birds that are misrepresented, misidentified and misappreciated more than any other, it would have to be gulls. The town centre “seagull” is widely chided and seen as an unwelcome addition to the local wildlife scene. But there’s more to gulls than meets the eye.

The reason that gulls in the built environment aren’t everyone’s favourite visitor, is the fact they are noisy, aggressively unconcerned with people and leave a trail of mess behind them on the street. Why, they sound almost human!

But lets not linger on the “seagull” when there is a fascinating group of birds to be discovered in this family, for anyone with the inclination to look beneath the surface. This is by no means a complete digest of local gulls, but a overview of just a some of the highlights. One of the most beautiful birds in the country, belongs to the gull family and we are lucky enough to have one of the few colonies, at Orcombe Point, at the mouth of the River Exe.

Kittiwakes are so called because this is their call in the breeding season – “Kitti-warke, Kitti-warke”. They are a small, brilliant white gull with a jet black eye and slender yellow bill. In flight, look out for a dark ‘W’ across the wings and back, and a short forked tail. Kittiwakes nest in colonies, often numbering into the thousands, but our local group is far from this magnitude. Kittiwakes are suffering  at the moment as their main prey item in the breeding season, sandeels, are getting increasingly hard to find. This was previously thought to be due to overfishing of sandeels, but recent research suggests it could be because the sandeel’s food, in turn, is becoming scarce and no-one fishes for copepods!

Little gulls are a firm favourite of any birder who has turned their attention to the Larid family. As their name suggests they are tiny, and much more sea-going than other gulls. Periods of bad weather tend to force little gulls closer in to shore, where they are easier to see. Recently, four or five little gulls have been seen from Seaton beach, by the dedicated sea-watchers of Seaton. Many (many) hours of gazing into the watery horizon are rewarded by moments like this, when a little gull bobs jauntily into view.

About the same size as a blackbird, little gulls are dwarfed by all other gulls, but beware – don’t rely on this feature to solely guide your identification, as there will often be no other birds around to compare them to, when you see a little gull.

A gull seen with no black on the wings at all, is something to command a second look as this will be one of the two white winged gulls that sometimes crop up on our coastline. If its a little smaller than the local herring gulls, then this will be an Icelandic gull. If its bigger, thick-set and butch, its the impressive Glaucous Gull. Both are birds of northerly latitudes, which means they seldom venture down our way in any great number, but once seen they are hard to forget.

Finally, no winter visit to the Axe estuary is complete without sightings of Mediterranean gulls. As their name suggests, they are more frequently found in warmer climes, but the Axe seems to be a favoured winter retreat. A bit like St Moritz. They look a lot like black headed gulls, until someone points out what to look for. They are overall a paler bird than a black headed gull and, as adults, have pale wing tips. Rather than having double spots on the head in winter, the Med gulls develop a dark smudge over the back of the head. They have a heavyish red bill and long red legs, and are simply stunning!

Next time you see a pile of white, grey and black birds roosting on the shoreline, or scattered over a field, take a closer look and see if any of these elegant specimens is to be found in their number.