132 



THE OOLOGIST 



I visited this nest again May 30tli 

 and found it deserted. I think that 

 after building so many nests and leav- 

 ing them as unsuitable to lay eggs in, 

 the bird finally decided that the ono 

 she had used was unfit to rear a fam- 

 ily in and she had probably started 

 again somewhere else. 



I never saw but one other set of the 

 Robin which contained spotted eggs, 

 and that was a set of four which i 

 found about twenty years ago. I re- 

 member very distinctly that three of 

 them were decidedly spotted and the 

 fourth was a plain blue one. I bo 

 lieve these spotted eggs of the Robin 

 are are very unusual here in eastern 

 Massachusetts. 



Horace O. Green. 

 Wakefield, Mass. 



Stratton and Bluff Islands. 



The Tern Colony 



All along the rocky coast of Maine 

 the scenery is very pretty. The heavj^ 

 surf, from an ever rough sea, is Iiurled 

 up over immense boulders and churn- 

 ed into foam in ever so many pi ices. 

 The dark spruce and other similar 

 It^ees en the mainland, and oi' many 

 of the islands, are very noticeable. 



There are many bays along the 

 coast wherein are located a groat num- 

 ber of islands, some, just small barren 

 ledges, some low, grassy one.5 and 

 ethers large and wooded. Casco Bay 

 alone has 365, — one for every day in 

 the year, — and two of them lying close 

 together are Stratton and Bluff. They 

 are about two and one-half miles out 

 from Prouts Neck which is a part of 

 Cape Elizabeth, Maine, 



Strattons is a low, grassy island and 

 has a dairy farm on it. Bluff is much 

 smaller, very rocky, and uninhabited. 

 On them a colony of over one thous- 

 and pair of Tern breed; the greater 

 part of them are the Common Tern; 



the smaller, the Arctic. In most of 

 the Maine colonies, the Common spe- 

 cies will be found in much the greater 

 numbers. They arrive at these is- 

 lands in spring about May 15th and 

 depart about September 15th. These 

 dates seem to prevail on most of the 

 islands and were obtained from the 

 keepers, who, also said that the Terns 

 always came in the night and departed 

 in the night. They are very noisy 

 when they arrive at their breeding 

 places and at Strattons, the man in 

 charge of the Jordon Dairy, said he 

 was always awakened the night they 

 came by their loud cries. 



It seems as though they must be 

 guided in migration by light houses 

 for they appear to prefer to live on 

 some island where there is a light 

 house or nearby. At night the great 

 light on Cape Elizabeth may be plainly 

 seen and these are the two nearest 

 islands. Farther along up the coast 

 this feature is noticeable and the big 

 colony that breed on Matinicus Rock 

 will refer to in other notes. Visitors 

 are allowed on Strattons, your name ii 

 requested and of course no firearm'^ 

 are allowed. 



It was a wonderful sight to me, when 

 I first visited an island where a large 

 colony were breeding and even now, 

 after seeing many of tliem, enjoy it 

 and make them a call if I have time. 



They seem so pretty, so active, and 

 so different from our inland birds. It 

 is very interesting to watch a Te'-u 

 coverhig her eggs in the pebbly shin- 

 gle, with the hot sun shining down on 

 her — (not leaving the incubating to 

 the sun, as some have stated by the 

 way) — and note the pretty little things 

 ■she does. One thing they seem to like 

 ,o do is to draw their bill through 

 ,>.€ shingle like a person would in mak- 

 ing marks with a stick. You can get 

 vithin twenty feet of them by being 

 careful. How much time they put in 



