Ichthyaetus hemprichii
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~20% in a week ~40%
The sooty gull (Ichthyaetus hemprichii) is a species of gull in the family Laridae, also known as the Aden gull or Hemprich's gull. It is found in Bahrain, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, India, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Maldives, Mozambique, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tanzania, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. As is the case with many gulls, it has traditionally been placed in the genus Larus. The sooty gull is named in honour of the German naturalist Wilhelm Hemprich who died in 1825 while on a scientific expedition to Egypt and the Middle East with his friend Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg.
The sooty gull is native to the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, the Gulf of Oman, the Persian Gulf and its range extends as far east as Pakistan. It is also native to the east coast of Africa as far south as Tanzania and Mozambique. It occurs as a vagrant in India, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine and Bahrain. It is a coastal bird, seldom going further out to sea than about 10 km (6 mi) beyond coastal reefs although it has occasionally been seen 140 km (87 mi) from land. It frequents ports and harbours... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Addo Elephant National Park | 🇿🇦 South Africa |
More parks will be added in future updates.
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zanzibar City | 🇹🇿 Tanzania | |
| 2 | Jeddah | 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia | |
| 3 | Dar es-Salaam | 🇹🇿 Tanzania | |
| 4 | Mombasa | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 5 | Dubai | 🇦🇪 United Arab Emirates |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Sooty Gull sighting in Addo Elephant National Park on a given day, based on 10 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 106th most-seen of the 243 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 20%, and over a week to about 40%, if each day is a fresh chance.
March
In that month about 30% of wildlife watchers report a Sooty Gull in Addo Elephant National Park on a given day, against under 5% in April to February, the lowest months.
Between 9 am and noon
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Sooty Gull sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Addo Elephant National Park, in our data
Addo Elephant National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Sooty Gull sightings: about 10% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Sooty Gull is recorded against all the birds logged in Addo Elephant National Park (10 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
