18 Nebraskaland • April 2019
PHOTO
BY
JOEL
G.
JORGENSEN
LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL
Anyone who has painstakingly searched through a flock
of gulls in Nebraska in fall will understand how difficult it
is to pick out anything that isn't a ring-billed or herring gull,
which have white heads and pale gray backs or "mantles."
But a European invader, the lesser black-backed gull (LBBG),
has come to save us from monotony. The LBBG is a large
gull with dark gray or blackish adult or near-adult plumage
that thankfully stands out like a sore thumb in a flock of the
more common gulls. As the observers of the first Nebraska
LBBG stated: "The mantle and back were charcoal gray,
much darker than [those of] either the ring-billed or herring
[gull]".
The first North American record of LBBG was in 1934,
and numbers have increased steadily since the 1970s, as the
European populations have increased. LBBGs, like other large
gulls, are beneficiaries of modern society, which produces an
abundance of food. Morsels leftover or thrown out in a fast
food parking lot or garbage dumps can be a substantial meal
for a scavenging gull. It is thought that since most North
American LBBGs are more dark gray than blackish, they
belong to the subspecies graellsi, which breeds in Greenland.
The LBBG was first noted in Greenland in the 1980s, and
breeding was confirmed in 1990 in two locations in the
southwestern part of the island. Increasing numbers of these
Greenland birds are wintering in eastern North America, first
along the Atlantic Coast, and spreading since the 1990s into
interior North America.
Nebraska's first report of LBBG was in 1992, an adult
discovered at Pawnee Lake State Recreation Area in
Lancaster County. The first with tangible evidence was
photographed in 1994 at Lake McConaughy in Keith County.
Since the mid-1990s, LBBG has become an expected spring
and fall migrant, and occurs occasionally in mid-summer and
mid-winter. Each spring and fall nowadays there are multiple
reports; in spring, 15 or more individuals are usually reported.
Gulls are ignored by a lot of people, reviled by others, but
sifting through flocks in early spring or late fall is a favorite
pasttime of serious birdwatchers. The addition of the LBBG
has added a bit of spice to otherwise dreary days.
Visit the Birds of Nebraska – Online (birdsofnebraska.org)
for more information about Nebraska birds.
By W. Ross Silcock
IN THE FIELD
