STARLING IN SCOTLAND, INCREASE AND DISTRIBUTION 21 



SUTHERLAND AND CAITHNESS. 



The Starling was rare previous to the year 1870, and 

 is at present (1887) confined mostly to the coast-line. A 

 pair bred at Balnacoil, however, ten miles up the river Brora, 

 in 1879. Abundant on the west, and common on the 

 North Coast. Common by 1868 (Sinclair's List), and very 

 abundant at Brawl Castle near Thurso in 1885. Very 

 abundant at Hempriggs near Wick, and all over the 

 cultivated land along the shore. 



Caithness would therefore seem to have been somewhat 

 removed from the direct influence of the great migration 

 streams which rush through the Orkney Islands and the 

 Pentland Firth to the north, and also equally out of the 

 direct influence of the first waves pouring into the Moray 

 Firth. How much Caithness coast-lines have been indebted 

 to direct lateral extension and to an overflow from congested 

 areas to the north, or how much to a similar lateral extension 

 from the south, it is not easy to determine ; but it apparently 

 succeeded the observance of the spring migration, both here 

 and on " Dee." 



ORKNEY AND SHETLAND. 



Buckley gives us our statistics for Orkney. Abundant 

 in Low's time, and certainly not less common now. Resident 

 and breeding. Mostly migrate in cold weather, but a few 

 remain, roosting in holes in walls, etc., and in cliffs and in 

 the rock-dove caves ; and an equal abundance is recorded 

 from Shetland as long ago as the date of the " Old Statistical 

 Account" (1793), p. 189. 



OUTER HEBRIDES. 



As early as 1841, breeding and abundant, flocking in 

 July. Resident in flocks till April. As far back as 1830 

 MacGillivray speaks of it in St. Kilda, where it had a Gaelic 

 name. In 1848 Sir William Milner found its nest there. 

 Gray found it common in 1871 in St. Kilda. MacGillivray 

 goes as far back even as 1820 and speaks of it as inhabiting a 

 cave on the west coast of Harris in " vast numbers " ; and we 

 also notice the remark in Charlesworth's "Magazine of Natural 



