Gulls are often maligned as “rats of the sky,” but is that assessment warranted? Isn’t there beauty in their plaintive calls? Aren’t they as evocative of the coast as salt air, foghorns, bell buoys, lobster boats and lighthouses?
Or are they simply too common, too messy and too pushy to deserve our admiration?
Gulls, love them or hate them, are smart, fascinating, even beautiful, as our gallery shows. Just don’t call them seagulls. Birders will tell you there is no such animal.

The Oscar-winning director from Hollywood’s Golden Age grew up in Portland, but it took a friend of Ford’s from Louisiana to get his hometown to formally recognize his achievements.