Laughing Gull

Uploaded on Mar 12, 2008

A laughing gull doing what it does best.

Uploaded on Mar 2, 2007

2002 nest count of the Laughing Gull colony at Jamaica Bay NY, counting birds for airplane safety

Uploaded on Jun 16, 2009

Establishing Domince. These two individual Laughing Gulls are in a competitive interaction to establish their place in the pecking order in the flock. Both of these individuals participated in this behavior for nearly 10 minutes with neither giving ground. Toward the end of this clip, they finally engaged in a physical confrontation.

Usually, these "pecking order" interactions end quickly with no physical contact. The pecking order is a flock behavior that serves to minimize physical interations and associated injuries. Each individual eventually learns its place in the flock.

In this case, the dominanant individual is not yet clearly established. Watch these birds carefully and note the various behaviors used to express dominance without physical contact, such as pecking at the sand, a displacement behavior to avoid pecking at each other. Note the posturing, the distance between them, the orientation to each other etc. Birdwatching is more than just IDing a bird. These activities are what makes birdwatching so very interesting.

Also note that the nearby birds seem to be indifferent to this activity.

Uploaded on Jun 16, 2009

Feeding Behavior, dominance heirarchy,