1909 Notes. 1 59 



Viviparus (dead shell) in Co. Limerick. 



On the nth February, while workiug the banks of the River vShannon 

 below Limerick, I found a specimen of Jlvipanis viviparus^ dead and 

 somewliat eroded. The shell was underneath a stone, on a mud deposit 

 amongst Bythinea and various Limnsese. A good search failed to 

 reveal a further specimen, living or dead. The locality was in the range 

 between high and low water, covered by about 4 feet of water at the top 

 of the tide. How this shell, a purely English species, came here, is a 

 question that needs some solution, which I will leave to the readers of 

 the /) ish Nafnra/i>(. I shall continue to search and an}- further finds I 

 shall announce to the readers in due course. 



Harry Fogkrtv. 

 Limerick. 



Nests of Land-birds in Holes on Marine Islands. 



I have been informed by Mr. H. M. Wallis, of Ashton Lodge, Reading, 

 that on 3rd June, 1S86, he ascended Illanaran, a lofty and precipitous 

 stack off the vS W. corner of Aranmore, in Donegal, i^ miles from the 

 mainland. 



This stack is destitute of any bush or even a tuft of rushes, and is the 

 home of Great Black-backed and other Gulls and of Cormorants. Mr. 

 Wallis states that in burrows, in some of which he found Storm Petrels, 

 he discovered three nests of land-birds, of white grass, without feathers, 

 and containing eggs. One of these was a Wheatear's, but the other two 

 contained eggs which ate characteristic of the Reed Bunting {E. schcunidus) 

 though no such bird was seen. IMr. Wallis has kindly presented two of 

 these eggs to the Dublin Museum. He says that he found the nests at 

 the ends of burrows, 2 feet deep. 



In British Birds, vol. I., p. 94, Major Trevelyan records that on a small 

 marine island, about a mile off the west coast of Ireland, he found two 

 nests of Meadow Pipits containing eggs in holes in the ground, and that 

 one of the eggs was identified at the South Kensington Mu.seum. 



I should not have been so much surprised if they had belonged to the 

 Rock Pipit, which nests in .small cavities, but such a site is a departure 

 from the ordinary habits of the Reed Bunting and Meadow Pipit. 



Mr.W. H. Turle stated {Ibis, 1891, p. 6.) that he found on Inuishvicillane, 

 one of the Blaskets, a Wren's nest containing six eggs at the extremit)- 

 of the burrow of a Puffin, and that the nest was not domed. 



The latter point is not surprising, for Dippers' nests when built in 

 holes of bridges are not domed. 



Nests found in holes on marine islands should be carefully examined, 

 as this adaptation to circumstances is remarkable. The burrows afford 

 shelter not only from the storms l>ut also from the voracious gulls. 



R. J. USSHER. 

 Cappagh, Co. Waterford. 



