Gulls

I don’t know why but it drives me nuts when someone points out one of the gull species here (or anywhere) and says "Look. A seagull". I really should not be so uptight about it, but there are so many different species of gulls that I just kind of bristle when someone lumps them all together under the ubiquitous term "seagull". It happened again yesterday when a friend popped in for a surprise visit.

Arctic Bay and the environs hold several species of gulls. The most common of these is the Glaucous Gull (Larus hyperboreus) a colony of which nests on the St George Society Cliffs. They are everywhere here. Complicating it’s identification though, is the Iceland Gull (Larus glaucoides) which are common enough up here. I pretty much can’t tell the two apart unless I see them together or have Seabirds, An Identification Guide by Peter Harrison with me. Alas, it is sitting in a box in storage in our seacan, I miss my books. Basically the two similarly patterned birds can be told apart by size (the Iceland Gull is smaller) and the proportion of the bill. The other very common gull around town is Thayer’s Gull (Larus thayeri) very similar to the Herring Gull.

For the other gulls one must go a little further afield and get out of town. The Ivory Gull (Pagophila eburnea), a gull of ice and floe edges is my favorite, pretty and delicate looking.  It is frequently described as being tern like, and it certainly is.  Its voice sounds like a terns and its flight is reminiscent of terns also.  They are a curious bird and will hang around and check you out when you travel on the ice. Unfortunately it is becoming rare, people talked about seeing them in town all the time, something I’ve never seen in my six years here.  I’ve heard of a couple of reasons for their decline, including less multi-year ice and being killed incidentally by Greenlanders when they hunt Kittiwakes. I’ve also heard recently that the outlook isn’t as dire as once thought, that breeding birds surveys haven’t told all of the story, that breeding birds just aren’t being found, but that the birds are out there. The anecdotal evidence however from here, is that there are less birds around.

Black-legged Kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) are another delicate looking gull of the floe edge, and very common in the area.  There is a huge colony on Prince Leopold Island. Prince Leopold is an incredible place, 1000 foot cliffs ring the island, with such numbers of birds, Thick-billed Murres, Kittiwakes, Guillemots, and Glaucous Gulls amongst others, that it looked like clouds of mosquitos as the ship drew closer.

Sabine’s Gull (Xema sabini). Ah Sabine’s Gull, I’ve yet to see one. Bylot Island, over by Pond Inlet, has colonies of them, and you would think that at least one would find its way over here, or near me somewhere. I missed my best opportunity when leading Quest Nature Tours Northwest Passage Trip in 2000. We were cruising in Milne Inlet and I left the bridge and headed down below. That of course was when several Sabine’s Gulls flew by. Ah well, one of these days.

Ross’s Gull (Rhodostethia rosea) is a theoretical possibility up here, but pretty unlikely.  I was lucky enough to see Ross’s Gull in Churchill Manitoba.  It is a truly beautiful bird.

A couple of years ago, on a spring camping trip, we saw a Great Black-backed Gull (Larus Marinus) about 100 kms south of Arctic Bay.  It was an unusual sighting as they wouldn’t normally be found in the area.  There was only one, and I haven’t seen another in the area since.

I enjoy gulls, and look forward to their arrival each spring.  And to the challenges that some present in identifying them.  Maybe this year a Sabine’s Gull will come visit on its way south.