196 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



its run we caught it as it tried to escape over the rough 

 vegetation. We set our traps in the runs, and easily 

 obtained specimens ; some of the Voles were probably 

 trapped in the course of their ordinary wanderings, but others 

 undoubtedly came to the cheese which we were using as bait. 



The thickly-populated haunts on the Black Craig are in 

 the drier parts of the hillside, but in a valley behind Strom- 

 ness, locally known as the Looms, we found the Voles 

 common in soft, marshy ground where peat-cutting has long 

 been in progress ; here also the Voles inhabited the drier 

 mounds, but their runs were distinctly shown on the wet 

 ditches as well as on the dry ground. 



In South Ronaldsay, as on the mainland, the main haunts 

 of the Orkney Vole are on the hillsides and along the borders 

 of the ditches. We did not, however, see such runs as we 

 had met with around Stromness, but we learned that the Vole 

 was common on the island and well-known as the " Cuttick " 

 to the inhabitants. Miss Annie Allan of Burwick Farm 

 brought us one that had been captured by the herd-boy with 

 the aid of a dog on August 1 6 ; and we ourselves trapped 

 one in Burwick Churchyard, where the prevailing plant was 

 the tall docken, and where the height of the wild vegetation 

 hindered us from seeing anything in the nature of runs at all. 

 In Burwick Churchyard the Vole was the companion of the 

 Lesser Shrew and of a very dark form of Jlhts musculus. 



We were very anxious to obtain a nest of the Orkney 

 Vole, and were at length put on the right scent by Mr. 

 George Ellison, Liverpool, who had seen a dog unearth one 

 in a little mound. Mr. Ellison and I spent the evening of 

 August 23 in the Looms behind Stromness, and succeeded 

 in discovering the nests. These are placed in the centre of a 

 small mound overgrown with vegetation, and have several 

 approaches which prevent the animals being caught unawares. 

 We dug up and traced out the various routes, and carefully 

 measured the same ; Mr. Ellison then drew out to scale the 

 plan of the Vole's fortress which is here reproduced. In the 

 one mound there were two nests, separated by a distance of 

 six inches. The larger was oval-shaped, composed entirely 

 of fine hay in a dense mass, and measured eight inches in 

 length by five in breadth towards one end, and three in 



