Name

Larus michahellis

Yellow-legged gull

Framing

Phylum: Chordata

Subphylum: Vertebrata

Class: Aves

Order: Charadriiformes

Family: Laridae

Genus: Larus

Species: michahellis

Habitat

Beaches, sea cliffs and coastal areas in general, although it also frequents inland areas, especially near rubbish dumps. It is very frequent in the vicinity of coastal population centres, where it can breed successfully in human buildings.

Feeding

Free. Gregarious. Predators of fish and marine invertebrates, although like other large gulls, they often engage in kleptoparasitism, nest predation, scavenging and scavenging, where they may also prey on rodents and other small terrestrial animals.

Distribution

Western and southern Europe and north-west Africa. In Spain it is distributed along the entire coastal strip. Since the middle of the last century it has been colonising the Atlantic coasts of France, the English Channel and central Europe.

Conservation status

Not threatened

Additional information

Free. Gregarious. Large gull (60 cm) with robust head and bill, grey mantle and white head, belly and tail and the ends of the outermost primaries black with white dots. Legs yellowish-orange rather than pinkish and bill orange with a red dot at the end of the lower mandible. Young of the year have a mottled brown and white plumage, black bill and somewhat pinkish legs, and take four years to reach adult plumage, doing so progressively. Mostly sedentary. Until very recently, this gull was considered a subspecies of the herring gull, with which, morphologically, it shows few differences, some of which are not very evident.