Listen to the Laughing gull
Tip: press play to see the sound's live frequency spectrum in blue over the waveform.
About the Laughing gull
The Laughing gull is a bird in the family Laridae (order Charadriiformes). Adults have a wingspan of about 105 cm and weigh around 300 g.
What does the Laughing gull sound like?
Birds produce sound with the syrinx, a vocal organ deep in the chest that can make two independent sounds at once. Songs tend to be long and patterned and are used to hold territory and attract a mate; calls are short signals for contact, alarm and flight.
The recordings here are labelled as larus atricilla. Listen for differences in rhythm, pitch and repetition – the spectrum display makes it easy to see whether a sound is a pure whistle (a thin line), a harsh call (a broad band) or a trill (rapid repeated marks).
From Wikipedia
The laughing gull (Leucophaeus atricilla) is a medium-sized gull of North and South America. Named from its laugh-like call, it is an opportunistic omnivore and scavenger. It breeds in large colonies mostly along the Atlantic coast of North America, the Caribbean, and northern South America. Two subspecies are accepted, L. a. atricilla, which occurs from the West Indies to the Venezuelan islands, and L. a. megalopterus, which occurs from southeast Canada down to Central America. The laughing gull was long placed in the genus Larus until its present placement in Leucophaeus.
More from the family Laridae
Black-headed gull
Chroicocephalus ridibundus
European herring gull
Larus argentatus
Common tern
Sterna hirundo
Common gull
Larus canus
Lesser black-backed gull
Larus fuscus
Arctic tern
Sterna paradisaea
Caspian tern
Hydroprogne caspia
Black-legged kittiwake
Rissa tridactyla
Gull-billed tern
Gelochelidon nilotica
Great black-backed gull
Larus marinus
Black tern
Chlidonias niger
Sandwich tern
Thalasseus sandvicensis
Frequently asked questions
What does a Laughing gull sound like?
You can hear 1 recording of the Laughing gull on this page, including its larus atricilla. Birds produce sound with the syrinx, a vocal organ deep in the chest that can make two independent sounds at once.
What family does the Laughing gull belong to?
The Laughing gull (Leucophaeus atricilla) belongs to the family Laridae in the order Charadriiformes.
Sources & credits
- Larus atricilla by Tony Phillips – CC BY 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Wikidata Q528764 – CC0
- Wikipedia: Laughing gull – CC BY-SA 4.0
- Photo by VJAnderson – CC BY-SA 4.0