Seabirds of Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge

Glaucous Gull

(Larus hyperboreus)

The glaucous gull lives the farthest north of the four kinds of gulls common to coastal Alaska.

RANGE

Its world breeding range is circumpolar in the northern hemisphere, but nowhere does it extend farther south than about 59^oN. In Alaska they breed from Bristol Bay northward across the Arctic.

PLUMAGE

Glaucous gulls are similar in appearance to the closely related glaucous-winged gull of the southern Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska, but they are somewhat larger and paler in color.

NESTING

Glaucous gulls nest as scattered pairs or small groups in close association with other species. In the latter situation they play an ecologically important role as the principal predator on eggs and young of other seabirds. In this and other aspects of feeding ecology and general habits, the species displaces the glaucous-winged gull in northern Alaska. The breeding ranges of these two species overlap only at a few locations in the southern Bering Sea, including Nunivak Island, Etolin Strait, and possibly also the Walrus Islands and the Pribilofs.