From Opus

Photo by JJM

Rissa tridactyla

[edit] Identification

40cm
Summer Adult

• White, with silver-grey mantle and wings
• Wing tips black ("dipped in ink look")
• Bill yellowy-green
• Legs blackish
• Orange orbital ring

[edit] Distribution

Photo by rentoncharman
Bempton Cliffs, Yorkshire, England

Breeds around Iceland, the Faroes and Britain (absent from much of south and east where coasts lack suitable cliffs), coastal Norway and the north of the Kola Peninsula. In the far north breeds on Jan Mayen, Svalbard, Bear Island, Franz Josef Land and Novaya Zemlya. Also breeds locally in small numbers in north Denmark and Germany, the Channel Islands and north-west France, the north-western tip of Spain and at one site in Portugal.

Colonies occupied March (earlier in the south)-September, disperse after breeding and in winter occurs in the Atlantic from breeding range south to about Morocco, in the North Sea and the Mediterranean east to Italy.

Has occurred as a vagrant to most European countries, Malta, the Middle East including Aqaba in Jordan, North Africa, Canary Islands and Cape Verde Islands.

[edit] Taxonomy

Photo by Geoff Pain
Juvenile, Bempton Cliffs, RSPB, Yorkshire, England

There are 2 subspecies:

• R. t. tridactyla
• R. t. pollicaris

[edit] Habitat

Breeds on steep sea-cliffs, stacks and rocky islands, in some areas also on buildings. When not breeding occurs at sea often far from land. Sometimes seen at freshwaters near the coast or far inland after severe weather.

[edit] Behaviour

It nests only on cliffs.

[edit] Vocalisation

[edit] References

1. Collins Pocket Guide to British Birds 1966

[edit] External Links