The Western Gull

I love hanging out with the gulls. I know a lot of people consider them pests and I admit they have some bad habits. Opportunistic feeders, they can get in a lot of trouble in a fishing and tourist community but I would like to share some other interesting traits that make them special to me.

 

First, they have an incredible vocabulary. Though their distinctive voice is the voice of the coast, they actually have a large number of songs.  Gulls have a gentle cluck reserved for “family”, a bark used for calling the colony and a very loud screech.  The alarm shrieking is used on a Bald Eagle that perches too closely to the nests in Spring.  

The gulls are perfectly adapted for life on the edge of the Pacific Ocean. Did you know gulls are one of the few creatures that can drink seawater? The salt in the seawater they drink concentrates in glands above their eyes. This concentrated salt water flows out through the nostrils. That’s why, often, you see drops fall from their bills.

Gulls are useful weather indicators. Sometimes they just seem to delight in soaring on the wind drafts, wheeling up, down, back and forth – just for the joy of it. At the start of a big storm, they head inland to wait out gale force winds. When I see the gulls return to play on the still-whipping gusts, I know the storm is almost over.

Gulls have a strong sense of community. When food is scarce, if I offer a little treat to one seagull, he or she (hard to tell them apart) will call the whole colony to share it. You’d think the treat would be snapped up greedily and it is – once the colony is present.

Gulls are diligent guardians.  When the juveniles leave their nests, they do a lot of standing around on the beach. This is when they are shown how to fish and they learn all the other gull ground rules. The Western Gull adults watch over the newbies on the beach during this time, never leaving them alone. In fact, adult Western Gulls supervise the migratory Tern chicks as well as their own young.

Gulls mourn their losses. I watched a pair of gulls build a nest together on my neighbor’s roof; each bringing tufts of grass from the dunes. Then there was the mating, tending the egg in the nest, and a chick. The new parents took turns watching over their baby and running out to the ocean for fishy pabulum. They were tireless. Unfortunately, the chick fell off the roof. It survived for a while on the ground but finally disappeared.  When the chick disappeared, the parents flew over the dunes calling for it for a couple of days. Finally, on the second day as evening drew close; they seem to agree the chick was gone. The parents stood at the end of the dunes at sunset, just looking out together. After an hour or so, just before dark, they flew off to join the colony on the beach and never returned to the empty nest.

Take another look at our feathered friends sometime; shining in the sun and calling us to the shore.  They might have something more to say to you.