Gray-hooded Gull Chroicocephalus cirrocephalus Scientific name definitions

The Gray-hooded Gull is a small, hooded gull found in both South America and Africa. The South American subspecies is slightly larger and paler than the African subspecies; it seems highly unlikely that there is currently any gene flow across the Atlantic Ocean, but the two taxa have not diverged enough to be considered different species. In South America, the species is found on and near the Rio de la Plata drainage in Argentina/ Uruguay and the Ecuadorian and Peruvian coast. The species breeds in freshwater wetlands but is often found in flocks along the coast during the nonbreeding season. Gray-hooded Gull can be told apart from the similar Brown-hooded Gull by its gray hood in the breeding season, as well as slightly darker gray back and primary pattern.

38–45 cm; 255–360 g (race poiocephalus), 440–460 g (nominate); wingspan 100–105. Two or three-year gull. A tall, lanky gull with long bill, neck and legs. The breeding adult has the crown, face and throat grey , bordered with a narrow black line from hindcrown to lower throat; neck, tail and underparts white, a few birds faintly tinged pink below in spring; mantle and wings grey; underwing-coverts dusky; primaries mainly black, with small white windows ; bill red, tipped black; legs bright pinkish red; iris yellowish white, with bright red orbital ring. Slightly larger than L. ridibundus, and has darker underwing and different wingtip pattern. Non-breeding adult has hint of grey head pattern, without black border; bill duller red, with more extensive black tip. The juvenile  resembles that of  the Black-headed Gull L. ridibundus, but has a solid black wingtip, a darker underwing and a narrower dark tail band;the mantle, scapulars and wing coverts are brown with pale feather edging and the primary coverts are dark. The first-winter plumage resembles the juvenile but the head and body resemble the non-breeding adult. Races differ minimally, nominate <em>cirrocephalus</em> being c. 2% larger.

Editor's Note: This article requires further editing work to merge existing content into the appropriate Subspecies sections. Please bear with us while this update takes place.

• Gray-hooded x Hartlaub's Gull (hybrid) Chroicocephalus cirrocephalus x hartlaubii
• Gray-hooded x Laughing Gull (hybrid) Chroicocephalus cirrocephalus x Leucophaeus atricilla

Editor's Note: Additional distribution information for this taxon can be found in the 'Subspecies' article above. In the future we will develop a range-wide distribution article.

Tropical and subtropical coasts , offshore islands, and inland lakes and rivers. Breeds on rocky islands, earthen dykes, rarely on coastal dunes; in Argentina mainly in marshes. In Africa, occurs on estuaries, harbours, fresh and alkaline lakes; non-breeders also frequent settlements, cattle pens and fishing harbours; remains mainly along shores.

Many populations are permanent residents or disperse short distances, with many inland breeders moving to coast. Birds move up to 2000 km N along Atlantic or Indian Ocean coasts. Dispersal also apparent along coasts of W Africa. Presumed African birds have occurred as vagrants north to Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Spain, Gibraltar, Italy (2 van den Berg, A.B. (2015). WP reports. Dutch Birding. 37(2): 122–129. Close ) and N Red Sea (3 Shirihai, H. (1992). Grey-headed Gulls in Israel and their identification. Dutch Birding. 14: 1-6. Close , 4 Elmberg, J. and Muller, L. (2003). The first records of Grey-headed Gull Larus cirrocephalus in Egypt. Sandgrouse. 25(1): 67–68. Close ). Birds nesting in Argentina and W Uruguay disperse inland and along coasts, N to Paraguay and E Brazil. In Peru, it occurs as far S as Mollendo between July and September, exceptionally to northernmost Chile, with four records from Galápagos Is (5 Kirwan, G. M., D. Brinkhuizen, D. Calderón, B., Davis, J. Minns, and I. Roesler (2014). Neotropical notebook. Neotropical Birding 15:46–62. Close ). Vagrants recorded north to Colombia (6 Strewe, R., Navarro, C. and Beltrán, J. (2008). Primer registro de la Gaviota Cabecigrís (Chroicocephalus cirrocephalus) para la región Caribe y Colombia. Ornitología Colombiana. 7: 75–77. Close ), Panama (mainly August, September and March), Costa Rica (7 Obando-Calderón, G., J. Chaves-Campo, R. Garrigues, M. Montoya, O. Ramírez, and J. Zook (2013). Lista oficial de las aves de Costa Rica. Actualización 2013. Zeledonia 17(2):44–59. Close ), Barbados (May/June 2009), Florida (December 1998) and New York (July–August 2011) (8 Howell, S. N. G., I. Lewington, and W. Russell (2014). Rare Birds of North America. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, USA. Close ), and on Falkland Is. 

Opportunistic. Mainly fish  and invertebrates, occasionally termites; scavenges broken flamingo eggs and dead fish. In Mauritania preys on eggs of herons and cormorants. Often kleptoparasitic, on birds as diverse as cormorants in former Zaire, American Oystercatchers (Haematopus palliatus) in Argentina and terns (9 García, G.O., Favero, M. and Vassallo, A.I. (2011). Efecto de la asociación y actividad de un cleptoparásito sobre el comportamiento trófico de su hospedador. Orn. Neotropical. 22(4): 505–516. Close , 1 Olsen, K. M., and H. Larsson (2003). Gulls of Europe, Asia and North America. Christopher Helm, London, UK. Close ). In winter, scavenges refuse, dead fish and fish scraps. Can feed by plunge-diving; seizes small surface invertebrates while swimming; takes insects by aerial hawking.

Varied cackling and laughing calls, similar to those of L. ridibundus but deeper and hoarser (1 Olsen, K. M., and H. Larsson (2003). Gulls of Europe, Asia and North America. Christopher Helm, London, UK. Close ).

Lays in Apr–May in W Africa (before rainy season), early May in Peru. Colonial ; nearest-neighbour distance less than 1 m to a few metres, in Mauritania up to 100 m. Nest on bare ground , in clumps of reeds or papyrus, or on floating vegetation; in Mauritania in tufts of glasswort (Salicornia); shallow scrape lined with dry grass and bits of vegetation, to well built cup of rushes and grasses. Clutch three eggs  in South America, 2–3 in Africa (mean 2·4 in E Africa); incubation and fledging periods undocumented; chick buffy yellow, spotted black on head and upperparts, forming irregular linear pattern.

Not globally threatened (Least Concern). The global population is not precisely known but is estimated in the range of 455,000–940,000 individuals and thought to be stable. The largest populations are in equatorial Africa (race poiocephalus), with 200,000–400,000 birds in C & E Africa, up to 30,000 in W Africa, another 200,000–400,000 in coastal S Africa and up to 10,000 in Madagascar (10 Wetlands International (2015). Waterbird Population Estimates. Wetlands International, Wageningen, The Netherlands. Close ). If confirmed, these estimates greatly exceed earlier assessments; for example the population in S Africa has increased but was estimated at just 2000 pairs in 1980s (11 Brooke, R.K., Allan, D.G., Cooper, J., Cyrus, D.P., Dean, W.R.J., Dyer, B.M., Martin, A.P. and Taylor, R.H. (1999). Breeding distribution, population size and conservation of the Greyheaded Gull Larus cirrocephalus in southern Africa. Ostrich. 70(3–4): 157–163. Close ). The centre of abundance is in equatorial Africa, with several colonies larger than 2000 pairs in Senegal, Kenya and Tanzania; common seasonally at L Chad; abundant breeder at Massambwa (L Victoria). Suffers serious problems from egging in some areas, e.g. W Africa. Northernmost breeders in Africa are at the Banc d’Arguin, Mauritania, but the small colony there has declined from 60–70 pairs in 1959–1965 to 10–50 pairs in 1974–2004 (12 Isenmann, P., M. Benmergui, P. Browne, A. D. Ba, C. H. Diagana, Y. Diawara, and Z. El Abidine ould Sidaty (2010). Oiseaux de Mauritanie [Birds of Mauritania]. Société d’Études Ornithologiques de France, Paris, France. Close ).

Neotropical population (race cirrocephalus) is estimated at 25,000–100,000 individuals (10 Wetlands International (2015). Waterbird Population Estimates. Wetlands International, Wageningen, The Netherlands. Close ) though there are relatively few known nesting areas. It has recently become increasingly numerous and widespread on the Brazilian coast, where formerly rare, in the states of Rio Grande do Sul and Rio de Janeiro, with recent first records from states of São Paulo (Apr 2009), Alagoas (Mar 2010) and Pernambuco (Oct 2011) (13 Leal, S., Serapião, L.C.H. and Pereira, G.A. (2013). Registros documentados da gaivota-de-franklin Leucophaeus pipixcan (Wagler, 1831) no Nordeste do Brasil e da gaivota-de-cabeça-cinza Chroicocephalus cirrocephalus (Vieillot, 1817) nos estados de Alagoas e Pernambuco. Revista Brasileira de Ornitologia. 21: 105–108. Close ); in N Rio de Janeiro it is especially numerous during dry season, when recorded in flocks of up to 800+, and it has recently nested there (14 Tavares, D.C., Moura, J.F. and Siciliano, S. (2013). Distribution and abundance of the Grey-headed Gull Chroicocephalus cirrocephalus (Vieillot, 1818) in Rio de Janeiro, Southeastern Brazilian coast. Revista Brasileira de Ornitologia. 21(3): 168–175. Close ). Principal breeding populations in E South America are in NE Argentina. Formerly rare in Uruguay where it now breeds. On the Pacific coast it has become common only since the 1920s and was not recorded there by earlier expeditions; first discovered nesting W of Andes in 1967, in Peru at Laguna Grande (Ica); only a few known breeding sites, but probably c. 1000 pairs in Peru.