Ivory Gull

A Very Rare Gull

Ivory Gull

The Ivory Gull is a very rare gull to see in New Brunswick.  In fact, you could live your whole life here and never see one.  There was one reported from Pigeon Hill in 1997 and one from St-Thomas-de-Kent in 1998.  Our earliest record is one collected at Saint John in 1880.  Winter is the time one might see this gull, but very unlikely.

This rare gull is found almost always in the very far north, from Newfoundland across northern Labrador, the Arctic islands to Alaska.  It lives on the pack ice and feeds on carrion.  Here we might see it in winter along the coast feeding on winter carrion.  

The Ivory Gull (Pagophila eburnea) is a small gull (45 cm/18 in long).  It is all white in colour except for juveniles and first winter gulls which have dark blotching on the face and sometimes on the body and some black in the primary wing feathers.  The adult has black legs and feet and a black eye which contrast strikingly with the white body.  The bill is unique, a bluish colour with a yellow to orange tip.  See photo above.

I was lucky to see this gull shown in the photos of this post.  I was in St. John's, NL, on a gull workshop and this individual appeared on the ice of Quidi Vidi in the few hours before I had to board my airplane for home.  I spent the rest of my time with a fellow birder lying on the ice trying to get good photos.  It wasn't easy but I got the documentary photos presented here.

Ivory Gull

The Ivory Gull breeds in the extreme far north.  In North America it breeds on Baffin and Ellesmere Islands and Greenland.  It normally spends the rest of the year in the high Arctic.  It is a holarctic species, being found in Siberia and occasionally in the extreme northern-western parts of  Europe.  It feeds on fish, small marine mammals, excrement, and prey remains left by polar bears and seals.

Ivory Gull

The Ivory Gull nests in colonies on open ground.  The nest is made from whatever materials are at hand. One to three yellow-brown eggs with dark spots are laid.  Both genders incubate the eggs.  This species uses different techniques to hunt its food.  It usually walks along beaches but it also hovers over the water and plunge-dives for food.  It sometimes swims.  It sometimes feeds at night which would be necessary for such northerly living.  This species regurgitates pellets of its undigested food.  This is especially evident when it is feeding on lemmings.  It sometimes follows polar bears in order to feed on the remains of their prey.

Ivory Gull

The status of the Ivory Gull population is classified as 'near threatened'.  It has declined severely in some parts of its normal range due to pollution, hunting and climate change.  Some estimate the decline to be 80%.  It has completely disappeared in 13 of its previously know breeding sites.  

With this serious decline and the parallel decline in polar bear numbers (probably due to changing ice conditions due to climate change) things do not look good for this species.  Hopefully they will be able to adapt to living closer to human civilization and their population numbers will stabilize.  We are concerned for this unique and beautiful gull species .