Audouin's gull (''Ichthyaetus audouinii'') is a large

gull Gulls, or colloquially seagulls, are seabirds of the subfamily Larinae. They are most closely related to terns and skimmers, distantly related to auks, and even more distantly related to waders. Until the 21st century, most gulls were placed ...

restricted to the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...

and the western coast of Saharan

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

and the

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula ( ), also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in south-western Europe. Mostly separated from the rest of the European landmass by the Pyrenees, it includes the territories of peninsular Spain and Continental Portugal, comprisin ...

. The genus name is from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

''ikhthus'', "fish", and ''aetos'', "eagle", and the specific ''audouinii'' and the English name are after the French naturalist Jean Victoire Audouin. It breeds on small islands colonially or alone, laying 2–3 eggs on a ground

nest A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold Egg (biology), eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of ...

. As is the case with many gulls, it has traditionally been placed in the

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

Larus ''Larus'' is a large genus of gulls with worldwide distribution (by far the greatest species diversity is in the Northern Hemisphere). Many of its species are abundant and well-known birds in their ranges. Until about 2005–2007, most gulls ...

''. In the late 1960s, this was one of the world's rarest gulls, with a population of only 1,000 pairs. It has established new colonies, but remains rare with a population of about 10,000 pairs. This species, unlike many large gulls, rarely scavenges, but is a specialist fish eater, and is therefore strictly coastal and pelagic. This

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a fou ...

will feed at night, often well out to sea, but also slowly patrols close into beaches, occasionally dangling its legs to increase drag. The adult basically resembles a small European herring gull, the most noticeable differences being the short stubby red bill and "string of pearls" white wing primary tips, rather than the large "mirrors" of some other species. The legs are grey-green. It takes four years to reach adult plumage. This species shows little tendency to wander from its breeding areas, but there were single records in the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

and

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

in May 2003, and one spent from December 2016 to April 2017 in

Trinidad Trinidad is the larger, more populous island of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, the country. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is the southernmost island in ...

.Kenefick, Martyn 2017
Fourteenth Report of the Trinidad and Tobago Birds Status and Distribution Committee Records Submitted during 2016
Living World, J. Trinidad and Tobago Field Naturalists’ Club
PDF
Audouin's gull is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds ( AEWA) applies.

Gallery

File:Audouin's gull..jpg, Audouin's gull File:Ichthyaetus audouinii 20091001.jpg, In flight File:Ichthyaetus audouinii MHNT.ZOO.2010.11.122.2.jpg, Egg of ''Ichthyaetus audouinii'', MHNT

References

External links

* * * * * * * * {{Taxonbar, from=Q519583 Audouin's gull Birds of Southern Europe Birds of North Africa Birds of West Africa Audouin's gull Taxobox binomials not recognized by IUCN Taxa named by Charles Payraudeau