Kelp Gull

• On the Valdés Peninsula in Argentina it has developed behaviour that did not exist decades ago: it attacks living right whales at the surface to tear pieces of skin and blubber from their backs, to the point that the whales have changed the way they breathe so as to expose less of themselves.
• It is the only gull that breeds in Antarctica, and it also feeds on limpets by dropping them from the air onto the rocks.
• Its expansion, fed by landfill sites and discards, has turned it into a predator of penguin and cormorant colonies all along the South American coast.

Skeleton type

Vertebrate - internal bony skeleton (bird)

Habitat and environment

Coasts, harbours, landfill sites and islands throughout the southern hemisphere, including Antarctica

Sexual maturity

4 years

Gestation / incubation

27 days of incubation

Litter / clutch size

3 eggs

Sources consulted: https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larus_dominicanus