g6 The Irish Naturalist. April, 



foreshore between Carrickfergus to below Kilroot Point, while Larne 

 Lough still has a numerous colony, natural conditions not having been 

 much interfered with there. ' I believe there is a small herony at Redhall. 



The increased numbers in which the Red-breasted Merganser visits 

 the Bay now- is remarkable. I remember when the bird was quite rare 

 here ; while a couple or three winters ago a flock of not fewer than four 

 hundred — probably more — remained about three-quarters of a mile to a 

 mile off Holywood for several weeks ; and I see the birds in small com- 

 panies — up to eight or ten — ever}' da)' that I am on the shore now. 



Cormorants, too, after having become much scarcer than the}- were 

 early in the last century, have become more numerous again within the 

 last twenty years or so. When my book on the birds of the lough 

 was published in 1880, the largest number of Cormorants recorded as 

 having been seen by myself on any one occasion was seventeen ; that 

 was on the 25th February, 1873. On 3rd February, 1894, walking down 

 from Belfast to Holywood, near Tillysburn station, I saw within five 

 minutes no fewer than fifty-five, all flying inland from Belfast Lough 

 over the hills, apparently going to Strangford. On 29th September, 

 same year, I saw thirty-five in one flight near the same place, and going 

 in the same direction. These birds are very destructive to fish. I 

 understand one shilling for each bird killed is now paid for their 

 destruction on a certain important salmon river in the North of Ireland. 

 Four pence each used to be the fee at Horn Head. In the assize records 

 of the Co. Antrim for the year 1729, mention is made of a person in 

 Island Magee who had killed ninety-six Cormorants in one season. 



I suppose the numerous Cormorants that frequent the Co. Down 

 shores from Greypoint down to the entrance to the lough, find night 

 resting-places on their own shores, and probably in the Copeland 

 Islands ; but most of the rest of our local birds of this species seem to 

 roost at night at the Gobbins. From Whitehead, on 31st August, 1902, 

 I counted sixty-five flying down between 6 and 6.18 p.m. ; and on 7th 

 September no fewer than eighty flew down between 6 and 6.5 p.m. — 

 thirty in one flight. 



Lady DufFerin wrote me from Clandeboye, on nth March, 1897, that 

 eleven were seen at one time on the lake there a day or two pre- 

 viously. Some few Cormorants, probably non-breeding birds, now stay 

 here all summer. I have seen them on the lough in June. 



R. LivOYD Patterson. 



Holywood, Co. Down. 



Little Crake in Co. Kildare. 



The second Irish-taken specimen of the Little Crake {Porzaria parva) is 

 recorded by Messrs. Williams in the Zoologist of December last (ser. 4, vol. 

 vii., p. 460). It was shot at Rathangan, Co. Kildare, on November 12th. 

 An interval of nearly fifty years has elapsed since the previous record of 

 this rare bird. 



1 On 9th September, 1888, thirty-six Herons were seen together on 

 Swan Island, Larne Lough, and they have greatly increased since, — Eds. 



