1 6 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. 



Birds. 



Tlie total numljer of species ot" birds breeding on Sable Island is ten, 

 and in relative order of abundance they stand about as follows : Sterna 

 faradiswa. Sterna hirundo, ^gialitis scniipaluiala, Animodranms -prin- 

 ce f>s, Tringa i)ii)iutiUa, yEgialiiis nieloda cireunicineta. Sterna dongalli. 

 Merganser scrrator, Anas obsciira, and Act ft is maciilaria. 



The sandy character of the island, with its lagoon and its bars, makes it 

 a paradise for Terns, which are by far the most abundant and most con- 

 spicuous of its feathered inhabitants. These snowy and graceful birds 

 hover thick as snowflakes over the level stretches of dry sand-bar 

 where great colonies lay their eggs regardless of storms and tides that 

 sometimes urge the heavy surf tar beyond its usual bounds and sweep 

 away eggs and young by the thousand. The eggs are excellent eating, 

 and ' egg-picking,' as it is called, is systematically carried on by the life- 

 saving crews for several weeks after the birds begin to lay. Finally every- 

 body wearies of egg diet and the Terns are left to rear their young without 

 farther molestation from man. The 'egg-pickers' pass over the same 

 ground nearly every day and spare such previously overlooked nests as 

 chance to contain three eggs or more. I was told that, as the season 

 advanced, the eggs became so much more plentiful that a smaller and 

 smaller territory needed to be covered each time before the pails and 

 baskets were filled to overflowing. Since foxes have been introduced the 

 Terns have had a new and dangerous enemy, as attested by the numerous 

 wings and feathers that lie about the fox burrows. It is to be hoped every 

 eflbrt will be made by the proper authorities to protect these birds from 

 their worst enemy, man — or, to be more exact, in this case, woman, — 

 for elsewhere along our Atlantic coast they have been wellnigh exter- 

 minated in order to i'urnish the strange headgear that Fashion thought- 

 lessly imposes. 



Probably more than two thirds of the birds I saw were Arctic Terns, and 

 a large portion of the other third Common Terns, with a goodly sprinkling 

 of Roseates, the latter a species hardly to be expected so far northward and 

 associated with such boreal species as the Least Sandpiper and Semipalmated 

 Plover. A few individuals of the Arctic Terns were in the peculiarly 

 striking plumage in which they were once described as the Portland Tern. 

 Dissection showed that such birds were immature and not breeding. Rare 

 indeed was the moment when a Tern was not somewhere in sight, and the 

 incessant din of their cries was never out of my ears. Even during the 

 midnight hours, when all was still and the distant undertone of the dashing 

 sea seemed hushed, the sudden cry of a restless bird passing overhead 



