12 



ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



The farther north these, or any other, whales are killed, the 

 thicker is the blubber. The last season, 1906, was cold and 

 inclement, and it seemed to me that the blubber was thicker than 

 formerly. 



At Norrona station one Finner had herrings inside, and at the 

 Alexandra station ten had fed on herrings. The latter part of July 

 is the time when these whales first begin to eat herrings ; in August 

 they are more frequently found with herrings. 



BAL^ENOPTERA BOREALIS (Seihval). Plate I. 



I have just stated that these whales came in vast numbers this 

 year. In 1904 the four Shetland stations had only five of these 

 whales. In 1905 the number went up to thirty-two, of which the 

 Olna station had twenty-seven and the Alexandra none. 1906 

 showed the extraordinary number of 262. It was not only off the 

 Shetland coast where they were, but off Harris they seemed just as 

 plentiful. Once off the coast of Finmark there was a similar 

 invasion, when Finner whales kept away ; the following year they 

 were gone. To those who are interested in the migration of fish 

 and other denizens of the sea this will be noteworthy. These 

 whales feed on much the same food as B. sibbaldii and do not eat 

 fish. Hjort gives the length as from 40 to 50 feet. I counted 

 290 plates of baleen in one individual. The particulars of these 

 whales given below may be of interest : 



In the above average lengths I have not included the return from 

 Buneveneader station. A note from the manager says : " From i3th 

 June to 6th of July 62 Seihval were killed near St. Kilda ; 22 of 

 these were female, but no foetus ; dimensions, 36 to 48 feet and from 

 14-20 (girth). A storm came and brought them away (6th July), so 

 none were to be seen on the fishing grounds after that." 



The last paragraph is very interesting ; the whales, curious, 

 changeful creatures, went off on account of a storm. In Shetland 

 we had fine weather at the time and they stayed on for another 

 twelve days and left us on the i8th July. We had a storm on the 

 1 9th, few were seen after that. I particularly wanted a small fcetus 



