Black-headed Gull Chroicocephalus ridibundus spar at Lake Dali (43.297633, 116.571725), Inner Mongolia, China, elev. 1240 m (4,070 ft.), October. Black-headed Gull breeds in parts of Greenland and Canada and throughout the Palearctic, in China in Xinjiang and the Northeast. Migrates over much of China and winters in eastern and southern China, including Shanghai, where is common passage migrant and winter visitor. Breeding has blackish-red bill (bottom), non-breeding orange tipped black (top). (Craig Brelsford)Black-headed Gull, Lake Dali (43.297633, 116.571725), Inner Mongolia, elev. 1240 m (4,070 ft.), October. Black-headed Gull is distinguished from Brown-headed GullC. brunnicephalus by smaller size, stronger white leading edge to wing, and lack of white spots on black wing tip. Breeding areas largely disjunct, but winter ranges overlap. (Craig Brelsford)Breeding Black-headed Gull, Momoge National Nature Reserve (45.884965, 123.752320), Jilin, China, elev. 130 m (430 ft.), May. (Craig Brelsford)First-winter Black-headed Gull, Yancheng (33.514056, 120.530951), Jiangsu, China, December. Like winter adult, first-winter Black-headed Gull has black spot behind eye. This individual has lost the brown wing coverts but retains on its tertials the brown coloration indicative of its subadult status. (Craig Brelsford)
THE HOODED GULLS OF CHINA
shanghaibirding.com covers most of the species in China in the genus Chroicocephalus. Click any link:
