BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



drawn from the Convention rests rather on the 

 ground of moral than of actual support : it is 

 lamentable that she should seem to stand aside 

 from any international reform, any movement of 

 international benefit on behalf of agriculture, any 

 scheme for the rational and practical protection of 

 wild life. 



The country whose defection is most deplorable 

 is, of coarse, Italy. Once on a time there seemed 

 some hope that Italy might be brought into line 

 with her neighbours ; but the confirmed bird-taking 

 and bird-eating habits of her people nullify for the 

 present all attempts to suppress what has become 

 an enormous and lucrative trade. The huge 

 apparatus in use in that country destroy birds of 

 passage by the million. Appalling numbers are 

 also caught in the Balkans and in Russia, both of 

 which regions likewise remain outside the Con- 

 vention. Little wonder if Swallows grow scarcer 

 when a season's take at Crao is estimated at three 

 million birds. 



In Hungary itself Bird Protection appears to 

 have reached a very satisfactory position. The 

 Convention was incorporated in the national law 

 last year (1906), and this year has been marked by 

 the State adoption of Bird and Tree Day in the 

 schools, and the establishment of a State factory 

 for making nesting-boxes ; it is proposed by the 

 Government to provide these boxes in the national 

 forests, which cover an area of five million acres. 



[In a forthcoming issue we propose to give 

 extracts from the Introduction to the Proceedings 

 of the Conference, which contains matter of much 

 interest.] 



THE FOOD OP THE BLACK-HEADED 

 GULL. 



The Black-headed Gull has been for the last year, 

 and still continues to be, on its trial in the County 

 of Cumberland. Besides being a scheduled bird 

 under the Act its eggs are protected in Cumberland 

 under the Order of 1897, and its rate of increase is 

 now held by some to be too great to advantage 

 the fishing or even the farming industries. The 

 County Council accordingly requested Mr. D. 

 Losh Thorpe, M.B.O.U., and Mr. Hope, Curator 

 of Carlisle Museum, to investigate the matter, and 

 these gentlemen, in addition to making personal 

 investigation by examining the stomachs and 

 gullets of 100 birds shot at different seasons, have 

 obtained the opinions of 62 representative farmers, 

 anglers and gamekeepers in the district, and dis- 

 tinguished naturalists in other parts of Britain. 



Generally speaking, it may be said that the Gull 

 comes out remarkably well from the trial. The 

 direct post-mortems showed 42 per cent, of the 

 birds to contain those greatest pests of the agri- 

 culturists, wireworms and crane-fly larvae ; 82 had 

 taken food which could not be described as affecting 

 man in any way, consisting of harmless insects 

 and vegetable matter ; in 14 there were grains of 

 oats, and nine had eaten fish of some sort. The 

 staple diet appeared to be earthworms, and one 

 bird had devoured 30 slugs. They had all par- 

 taken of a very mixed dietary, but of the whole 

 number, 93 per cent, contained food, the consumption 

 of which is either beneficial or of no account to 

 man ; 40 per cent, contained a certain amount of 

 food — carnivorous insects, fish and grain — whose 

 destruction is considered harmful. The conclusion 

 drawn is that Gulls prefer worms, grubs, and other 

 insect food as long as they can get it ; but that if 

 they become too numerous, and this supply runs 

 short, they betake themselves to fish and cereals. 

 With regard to the latter, however, it is stated that 

 farmers who use the drill do not complain, as the 

 bird does not appear to take grain when it is once 

 covered. It is recommended that the investigations 

 should be continued and that, in view of the great 

 increase in the birds, the protection of the eggs be 

 removed. 



The opinions quoted by the Cumberland report 

 from the naturalists and farmers consulted are at 

 least as favourable to the Gull as are the conclusions 

 of Messrs. Thorpe and Hope. Thirty-three 

 out of the thirty-four naturalists consider the bird 

 " beneficial" or ''not harmful'' to farming, and as 

 the latter verdict is usually very emphatically 

 given it practically becomes a favourable one. 

 Among these authorities are the late Professor 

 Newton, whose words are " Harmless in regard to 

 fishing, highly beneficial in regard to agriculture"; 

 Mr. Howard Saunders, " Decidedly not harmful"; 

 Mr. Harvie-Brown, Mr. J. H. Gurney, Mr. Ogilvie- 

 Grant, Mr. F. C. Selous, Dr. Hartert, Mr. Frohawk, 

 Mr. Archibald (Lecturer in Agriculture, Leeds 

 University), Mr. Southwell, Mr. Radcliffe Saunders, 

 Mr. Aplin, Rev. F. C. R. Jourdain, Rev. H. H. 

 Salter, Mr. Meade-Waldo, Mr. A. H. Patterson, 

 Mr. Seth-Smith, Rev. J. G. Tuck, Mr. Oxley 

 Grabham, Mr. G. E. Lodge, and Sir Herbert 

 Maxwell. In respect of the fishing and angling 

 interests, opinion is more divided ; twenty con- 

 sider the species not harmful, five doubtful, 

 and four harmful. Only two of the fourteen 

 farmers have anything to say against it, these 

 two complaining of the eating of newly-sown 

 oats. The majority are strong in its favour. With 

 the anglers the balance is on the other side, seven 

 pronounce it harmful, four harmless. 



