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RECOVERY OF MARKED BIRDS (ABERDEEN 

 UNIVERSITY). 



BY 

 A. LAXDSBOROUGH THOMSON, m.a., m.b.o.u. 



Since the institution of tlie Aberdeen University Bird- 

 Migration Inquiry in 1909, over two hundred marked 

 birds have been reported. Many of these records are 

 of course quite insignificant, but most, I am confident, 

 will have some value when the time comes for their 

 classification and correlation. The few records quoted 

 below are selected from those which have a certain 

 individual value and interest, apart from other records 

 and facts. Most of these records are included in a 

 paper on " The Possibilities of Bird-marking, with 

 special reference to the Aberdeen University Bird- 

 Migration Inquiry," publiohed in the Proceedings of the 

 Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh, Vol. XVIII. , pp. 

 204-18 ; and in shorter form many of them were pub- 

 liohed in a circular which was copied by various news- 

 papers. The first Wigeon record Avas published by me 

 in British Birds, Vol. III., p. 220. and both the records 

 were briefly given by Mr. Gunnis in the Annals of Scot- 

 tish Natural History^ 1911, p. 118. No description of 

 methods is necessary here, and we may at once 

 proceed to the enumeration of the records we have 

 selected. 



A brood of five Wigeon ducklings {Mareca penelope) 

 was marked by Mr. Francis Gunnis on Loch Brora, 

 eastern Sutherland, Scotland, on June 19th, 1909. One 

 of these (A.U. 2052) was caught on September 3rd, 1909, 

 in a duck-decoy at Westpolder, Ulrum, province of 

 Groningen, north-eastern Holland, as reported by Mr. 

 H. J. Louwes of that place. A second member of the 

 brood (A.U. 2050) was shot early in January, 1911, on 

 the river Trent, about four miles above Gainsborough, 

 where it forms the boundary between the English 

 counties of Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire ; it was 

 reported by Mr. John Allison, Retford. 



