The very first line of the Wikipedia entry on Gull says: "Gulls, or colloquially seagulls, are seabirds of the family Laridae in the suborder Lari. ". Colloquially speaking all gulls are seagulls.
The entry lists 54 species of Gull, and indeed from a pedantic perspective, none of their common names are “seagull”. Nor are any of their binomial names Latin for “seagull”. But there is Larus pacificus, either very calm or associated with the ocean of the same name. Also there is Larus atlanticus, and Larus Marinus (pretty dang close).
I really don’t understand what the point of the distinction is. It’s not like there’s something else which is a seagull but not a gull. Seagull is just another word for the same bird… Or am I missing something?
There are weirdly rigid common names around birds. There is a whole thing about renaming them right now. They are essentially regulated terms that low level pedants respect. They are the same types of people who would correct you for calling Frankenstein’s monster ‘Frankenstein’.
The plant community is better. You could call a “sunflower” a “tall flower” and nobody would care. You might get a “oh, I’ve never heard that one” but never “there’s no such thing as a ‘tall flower.’” They just fall back to the scientific names when clarity is important.
IMO common names should just be useful. I will call any gull a seagull when talking to non-bird people because that is a term that is commonly understood and how effective communication works.
I understand the need for having one particular defined name for a species, honestly. That makes some sense to me. But just because taxonomically a bird is not called a seagull doesn’t mean that it is not a seagull. Otherwise what is a seagull? There is no bird that has the ‘official’ name “seagull”. So what, seagulls don’t exist? It’s a semantic distinction that is meaningless outside of its narrow context.
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as a Gull, is in fact, Sea/Gull, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, Sea plus Gull. Gull is not an categorization unto itself, but rather another component of a full identity made useful by the kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species components comprising a full identification as defined by its scientific classification.
The very first line of the Wikipedia entry on Gull says: "Gulls, or colloquially seagulls, are seabirds of the family Laridae in the suborder Lari. ". Colloquially speaking all gulls are seagulls.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gull
The entry lists 54 species of Gull, and indeed from a pedantic perspective, none of their common names are “seagull”. Nor are any of their binomial names Latin for “seagull”. But there is Larus pacificus, either very calm or associated with the ocean of the same name. Also there is Larus atlanticus, and Larus Marinus (pretty dang close).
I really don’t understand what the point of the distinction is. It’s not like there’s something else which is a seagull but not a gull. Seagull is just another word for the same bird… Or am I missing something?
There are weirdly rigid common names around birds. There is a whole thing about renaming them right now. They are essentially regulated terms that low level pedants respect. They are the same types of people who would correct you for calling Frankenstein’s monster ‘Frankenstein’.
The plant community is better. You could call a “sunflower” a “tall flower” and nobody would care. You might get a “oh, I’ve never heard that one” but never “there’s no such thing as a ‘tall flower.’” They just fall back to the scientific names when clarity is important.
IMO common names should just be useful. I will call any gull a seagull when talking to non-bird people because that is a term that is commonly understood and how effective communication works.
I understand the need for having one particular defined name for a species, honestly. That makes some sense to me. But just because taxonomically a bird is not called a seagull doesn’t mean that it is not a seagull. Otherwise what is a seagull? There is no bird that has the ‘official’ name “seagull”. So what, seagulls don’t exist? It’s a semantic distinction that is meaningless outside of its narrow context.
My fellow citizens, we got him.
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as a Gull, is in fact, Sea/Gull, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, Sea plus Gull. Gull is not an categorization unto itself, but rather another component of a full identity made useful by the kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species components comprising a full identification as defined by its scientific classification.
LOL, now do the Navy Gulls copypasta or “here’s the thing…”
Something something jackgull
In Swedish Larus Marinus is called “Havstrut” which would translate to Seagull but I guess that doesn’t count.