190 Wii^d Birds and their Haunts 



THE SOLAN GOOSE. 



A CURIOUS FIND ON THE BEACH. 



DURING a coastal ramble lately I came acroes a 

 bird lying on the sands on the North shore 

 opposite Berwick-on-Tweed. 

 It was a big bird — a young Solan goose, and it had met 

 its death by endeavouring to swallow a gurnet, a fish 

 with a big head. It had evidently pounced ravenously 

 upon the fish, and unable to pass it successfully, it had 

 succumbed. The general mode for this bird is to swallow 

 it head first. From the neck markings I was able to 

 class it as a bird of the first year. As is well known 

 to north country naturalists, the Bass Rock, in the Firth 

 of Forth, is a recognised rendezvous for these Solans to 

 breed, and altogether it is perhaps one of the most inter- 

 esting sights that the ornithologist can be placed before, 

 whether he surveys the crowd nestling upon their eggs, 

 greeting their mates on their arrival from the sea, or 

 squabbling, if one happens to intrude a little too near 

 another ; or to sit aside, and view the troops of birds in 

 adult and changing and first year's plumage, pass and 

 repass, surveying their visitor, and sailing past him in a 

 smooth, noiseless flight so near, that the eye and every 

 feather is distinctly seen, the bird motionless, except 

 a slight inclination of the head when opposite. On 



the Bass the great proportion of the birds build on the 

 ledges of the precipitous face of the rock ; but a con- 

 siderable number also place their nests on the summit, 

 near the edge, where they can be walked among ; there 

 the birds are quite tame, allowing a person to approach 

 them, as in the case of the Eider on Fame Islands. On 

 a certain occasion I took a small spaniel near the retreat 

 of these birds and this dog at once gave battle to the 

 geese, though forced to retreat * and had he not been 

 tied up, it is nearly certain that he would either have lost 

 his sight, or been tumbled over the rock, by the strokes 

 of the bird's wings. 



