June, 1896. 145 



THE TERNS OF KII,LAI,A BAY. 



BY ROBERT WARRKN. 



Of the tern family, four species are regular sutamer visitors 

 to Killala Bay, and breed within the district — the Sandwich, 

 Common, Arctic, and lyittle Terns ; while one, the rare Black 

 Tern, has only once been known to visit the bay. 



Up to the summer of 185 1, very little was known of the 

 Sandwich Tern {Ster^ia cafitiaca) in Ireland, and was first 

 mentioned as an Irish visitor by the late Wm. Thompson in the 

 Proceediiigs of the Zoological Society of I^ondon for 1833 from 

 a specimen shot on the 14th of September, 1832, in Belfast 

 Bay : again, on the 28th of July, 1838, an adult bird was shot 

 opposite *'The Grove" and several others were seen there in 

 September, 1839, and during the same month in 1844 : while 

 another specimen shot in Strangford I^ough on the i6th of 

 August that year was sent to Belfast for preservation ; the 

 above being all that was known to Wm. Thompson of this bird 

 on the northern coast. This writer, proceeding to speak of its 

 occurrence on the Dublin coast, mentions a specimen having 

 been shot near Clontarf in October, 1831 ; and in July, 1834, 

 two more were obtained near the same locality. In September, 

 1837, several were seen near Howth ; and one was seen at 

 DoUymount strand on nth May, 1842 ; while from that date up 

 to 1850, individuals were seen every summer, in June and July, 

 between Portmarnock and Malahide, and one was shot on 

 15th June that year on Ireland's Eye. 



The late Mr. J. J. Watters was the first to discover that it 

 bred on the coast, for on 17th June, 1850, when visiting that 

 great breeding-haunt of Terns on the Dublin coast, the Rockabill 

 (now long since deserted), he saw three birds flying about, and 

 found a broken ^%<g on the rocks, and although he saw 70 or 

 80 Roseate Terns, and at least twice that number of 

 Common and Arctic Terns on the wing, he was unable to 

 identify more of the Sandwich Terns than the three individuals 

 already mentioned, thus showing that these three birds were 

 mere chance stragglers from some larger breeding-haunt of 

 the species, at that time unknown. 



The preceding information being all that was known of this 

 tern in Ireland up to the date of the publication of Wm. 

 Thompson's work in 1851, I had the great pleasure of adding 



A 



