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JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



weeks I tried to shoot some of them, 

 but owing to the alertness of a Herring 

 Gull which invariably accompanied them, 

 I did not succeed in getting any, as the 

 gull would always see me and give the 

 alarm, when the Mergansers would fly 

 awa3^ Had it not been for the gull, I 

 could have got near to them without any 

 trouble, and although this gull was a 

 very beautiful specimen of the species, 

 I never could appreciate it. 



In the s:ime environment of which I 

 have read, we notice another species. 

 There may be three individuals or per- 

 haps fifty, flying in a straggling flock 

 with rapid strokes of the wings, just high 

 enough to avoid the crest of the waves. 

 This is Bonaparte's Gull, one of the 

 smallest of our species. As it flies 

 along, there is no regularity to its move- 

 ments. It darts here and there as some 

 floating object attracts it attention, and 

 if it be anything it wants, it hoveis over 

 it in mid-air and daintily touching its 

 feet on the water picks up the food and 

 at once commences looking for more, 

 returning to interview some other gull, 

 which lags behind, all the time acting as 

 if it enjoyed the storm as a huge joke. 

 This gull enters our estuaries about the 

 20th of Novell) ber and may be seen in 

 such places until the middle of December, 

 when they quickly disappear, one seldom 

 being seen during mid -winter. 



The Kittiwake Gull, larger than the 

 preceding, has much the same habits 

 except that it rarely enters the rivers. 

 While the Herring and Black-backed 

 Gulls may be shot from blinds on the 

 shore, Bonaparte's or the Kittiwake will 

 seldom come within range, unless de- 

 coyed. This is easily done, especially 

 from a boat, by waving a white cloth or 

 tossing some small object on the water 

 which will splash. As soon as one is 



killed or wounded, the others will hover 

 over it until nearly if not all of them 

 have been killed, and this is also char- 

 acteristic of the terns. The collector 

 hunting them for millinery purposes was 

 not long in realiziug this fact, and many 

 colonies of these beautiful birds were 

 nearly exterminated to satisfy the bar- 

 barism of modern fashion. 



To observe the terns we must repair 

 to the locality of some rocky islet where 

 they resort to breed during June, July 

 and August. Twenty years ago a col- 

 ony of Common and Arctic Terns, which 

 pei'haps numbered three hundred birds, 

 bred on the Heron Islands off Popham 

 Beach, also some fifty on the Black 

 Rocks in Sheepscot Bay. Owing to the 

 per^^ecution of the summer sportsman 

 and the fisherman, these colonies have 

 gradually grown less each succeeding 

 year, and I am sorry to say, for the past 

 two years, not a bird to my knowledge 

 has bred at either place. Although sev- 

 enty years ago they bred in abundance 

 on the coast of Sagadahoc County, I 

 think I can positively state that not one 

 individual has been hatched in this coun- 

 ty for the past two years. As we row 

 along the beaches the last of June, the 

 warm sunshine gleaming on the water, 

 with occasionally a warm wave of air 

 from oft' the land, impregnated with the 

 perfume of summer foliage, we are 

 aroused from our languor by the sharp 

 cry of one or more birds. Looking up 

 we at once recognize the Common and 

 Arctic Terns. We also notice that in- 

 stead of the bill being carried horizon- 

 tally with the body, as it is with the gnlls, 

 it is nearly perpendicular, and also that 

 the wings are longer and more pointed 

 in proportion to the body, than with the 

 gulls. Moving along a hundred or more 

 feet in air with quick strokes of the 



