3o8 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



not do justice to the brilliant colour I saw. Perhaps the difference 

 means that his nestlings and mine were not of the same age. It 

 would seem that in .some species, at any rate, the colour changes 

 rapidly with age. For example, Mr Geoffrey Leigh records {British 

 Birds, iii., p. 154) the mouth-colour of the nestling Tree-pipit 

 as "lemon-yellow," and adds, "when the nestling is about four 

 days old the mouth becomes deep carmine." Records of mouth- 

 coloration should, therefore, as far as possible, state also the age 

 of the nestling. — W. E.] 



Alpine S^wift in Wigto^wnshire. — Readers of the Scottish 

 Naturalist may be interested to learn that I saw an Alpine Swift 

 {^Micropiis inelba) here on the 30th July last. I am quite certain I 

 could not have been mistaken, as the bird came right over me, just 

 skimming the trees. Its larger size and the white markings on the 

 throat and abdomen make it very easily distinguishable from the 

 Common vSwift. I noticed in The Field of 31st July that a flight of 

 about a hundred of these birds had been seen in Kent on the 15th 

 of that month, also five in the same locality on the 22nd. Possibly 

 the one I saw was a straggler from the same lot.— Gilbert Holmes, 

 Whithorn, Wigtownshire. 



[In the B.O.U. List (p. 121) it is stated that no Alpine Swifts 

 have been captured in Scotland. But Mr Archibald Fairbairn 

 recorded in the Annals of Scottish Natural History for 1897 (p. 152) 

 that he examined and released one which was captured at Muirkirk, 

 Ayrshire, on the 25th May 1892, while Mr John Paterson, in the 

 Fauna of the Clyde Area (1901, p. 162), refers also to this example 

 and records another seen near the same locality on the 28th July 

 1900. — Eds.] 



Disappearance of Terns from the Skerries. — Apropos 

 of this subject, I think the following extract from a letter I have 

 recently received from Mr T. E. Arthur, the head lightkeeper, 

 worth a permanent record: "On consulting my notes on the 

 movements of birds, I find that on 14th July it was noticed 

 that the majority of the Terns frequenting the rock had 

 left — only a small number, the eggs of which were still unhatched, 

 remaining. This early departure prompted an examination of 

 the nests, which revealed the astonishing fact that in every case 

 the newly hatched chick was found to be dead. As nothing in the 

 nature of food was found in or near the nests and in no instance 

 had the parent birds been observed carrying sand-eels or other small 

 fish, the conclusion was inevitable that the unfortunate nestling had 

 died of starvation. This circumstance is the more remarkable con- 



