NIDIFICATION AND INCUBATION 339 



large, and some do not measure eighteen inches across. As 

 the season advances, the nests would grow smaller and 

 flatter, if it were not for the additions made to them, for 

 the sea-weed shrinks as it dries, and the bulky young one 

 pressing upon it is no light weight. In a shrunken condition 

 nests sometimes weather twelve months of storm and tem- 

 pest, and last until another season comes round ; in the 

 Faeroes, indeed, according to Miiller, Gannets more often 

 add to an old nest than start a new one, but I hardly think 

 that can be said at the Bass Rock. The Rev. N. 

 Mackenzie tells us they " are renewed from time to time " 

 at St. Kilda.* The odour of a Gannet's nest is not 

 altogether pleasant, for there is often a strong taint of 

 ammonia about it, arising from the excreta of the birds, 

 with which the surrounding rocks are freely bespattered, 

 often mixed with rain and spray, to say nothing of rotting 

 remains of fish. 



At the Bass Rock quite a category of miscellaneous articles 

 has been found at one time or another in Gannets' nests, for 

 instance, from various sources I have heard of a butter-scoop, 

 a battledore, a golf ball, two indiarubber shoes, some toy 

 whips, a scent bottle, a peacock's tail-feather, a knife, 

 some little baskets, and a net-maker's needle. So it 



♦ " Annals Scot. Nat. Hist.," 1905, p. 144. 



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