THE BIRDS OF FAIR ISLE, NATIVE AND MIGRATORY 71 



CUCKOO, Cnculus canorus. Mr. Tulloch tells me that he saw a few 

 on the island in September. 



SEA EAGLE, Haliaetits albicilla. A banished resident. Mr. Stuart 

 Wilson, the second oldest man in the island, told me that the 

 Sea Eagle formerly nested on the Sheep Craig, and continued 

 to do so during the early decades of the nineteenth century. 

 His mother had informed him that she remembered one of the 

 Eagles seizing a domestic duck and carrying it off for its young 

 on the Sheep Craig, and that lambs were frequently requisi- 

 tioned for a like purpose. Mr. Wilson is 65 years of age, and 

 his mother, who was born in 1805, was a young woman when 

 she witnessed the incident narrated. This would make the 

 date of the event about 1825, and it is between that year and 

 1840 that the bird ceased to breed, for it was no longer a native 

 when Mr. Wilson was born. There is another site of a former 

 eagle's eyrie on the island, though whether two pairs bred 

 or whether it was an alternative nesting place is uncertain. 

 No doubt the taking of lambs would lead to the bird's destruc- 

 tion, as soon as means were found to accomplish it. There is 

 an eminence on the east side of the island called Erne Hill 

 or Brae. 



PEREGRINE FALCON, Falco peregrinus. Two pairs nest on the 

 island. Single birds were seen almost daily by us, but the 

 young had evidently been driven off before our arrival, for 

 adults only were observed. Writing in 1700, the Rev. John 

 Brand in his " Brief Descriptions of Orkney and Zetland," tells 

 us that it was reputed that the Hawks " which are to be had 

 in the Fair Isle, are the best in Britain, which use to flee to 

 Zetland, or Orkney for their prey, these being the nearest lands, 

 and sometimes they'll find Moor Fowls in their nests, which 

 they behoved to bring from Orkney, seeing there are none in 

 Zetland, and the nearest isle they could have them in, was 

 Stronza or Westra, which is between 40 and 50 miles of sea, over 

 which at one flight they must carry these fowls to their nests." 



MERLIN, Falco (Bsalon. Single birds were seen on the nth and 1 2th 

 September (probably the same individual), and another on 

 4th October. They were doubtless on passage. 



KESTREL, Falco tinnunculus. Female Kestrels, possibly the same 

 bird, were observed almost daily from i6th September to 3rd 

 October. When seen the bird was generally in pursuit of small 

 birds, such as Twites, and it was occasionally mobbed by a few 

 Grey Crows. 



CORMORANT, Phalacrocorax carbo. A very common resident species. 

 Great numbers evidently nest at Fair Isle. 



