NOTES ORIGINAL AND SELECTED. 299 



headed kind. But several pairs of the lesser black-backed gull have appeared, 

 and stayed all the summer through on certain marshes. It is believed that these 

 birds have returned and bred there. 



'• The oyster-eaters have been seen nesting in a fresh locality, and the shell 

 ducks, the largest of all shore fowl, are reported to have bred. Shooting shore 

 fowl, which is an ancient Essex industry, is not allowed till August 15, which 

 saves the birds being murdered by Bank Holiday trippers. Suffolk should come 

 into line on this point, for it is absurd to be protecting birds on August i at 

 Harwich, while they are allowed to be shot across the river at Felixstowe." 



FISHES. 

 A Salmon in the Blackwater. — A salmon weighing 4^ 

 pounds has been found in an injured condition in the river 

 Blackwater, at Kelvedon, Essex, but how it reached so far in- 

 land is a mystery. That portion of the river where the salmon 

 was discovered is leased by the Gresham Angling Society, and 

 the theory most favoured by the members is that it came up the 

 Blackwater on the last big flood. Kelvedon is many miles from 

 the estuary of the Blackwater below Maldon, and the salmon 

 would encounter several weirs and mills in its ascent to the 

 higher reaches. Years ago occasional salm>on were caught in 

 the nets in the tidal portion of the Blackwater, but a specimen 

 of this fish has never been seen before in the river at Kelvedon. 

 The Times, April 12th, 1904. 



Why Fish is Scarce. — The increasing scarcity of fish 

 in the North Sea is attributed by Mr. H. Donnison, the Eastern 

 Sea Fisheries Inspector, to the sufterance of the natural enemies 

 of fish. In the Wash, which is a great fish nursery, there are,, 

 he says, in his half-yearly report, hundreds of seals, tens, if not 

 hundreds, of thousands of gulls, beside comorants, all living on 

 fish, of which a cormorant alone can eat seven pounds daily. As 

 these destroyers prey chiefly on small fish, enormous havoc is 

 caused among fish which otherwise would find their way into the 

 fishermen's nets. Of shell-fish, for example, Mr. Donnison 

 states that the gulls consume far more in an infant state than 

 are taken by fishermen in an adult state. 



MOLL US CA. 

 Limax cinereo-niger Wolf., in Essex. — This slug, which 

 has not been recorded previously for the Eastern Counties, is 

 common in Epping Forest near High Beach. It has also been 

 found near Staples Hill, Loughton, and in " Cook's Folly,' 

 Walthamstow. — T. Fetch, Leytonstone, June, 1904. 



