140 BRITISH HIHDS. 



BREEDING OF THE GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL 

 INLAND IN IRELAND. 



In the Birds of Ireland (p. 340), Mr. R. J. Ussher states that 

 the district round Naran (co. Donegal) is the only part of 

 Ireland in which he has ascertained that this Gull breeds on 

 islands in fresh water loughs. 



On the evening of June 15th, 1911, when on a very hurried 

 visit to an island in a lake in north-west Ireland, about 

 eighteen miles inland from the sea as the crow flies, on 

 which a colony of Lesser Black-backed Gulls {L. fnscus) 

 nests, my man found and brought to me two eggs which 

 seemed to be too large to belong to the aforesaid species. 

 Mr. Jourdain, to whom they were submitted, kindly wrote 

 me, under date June 28th, 1911 : "I have carefully measured 

 them and compared them with my series, and on the whole 

 think I am safe in ascribing them to the Great Black-backed 

 Gull. But gulls' eggs are notoriously difficult to identify, and 

 there is a bare possibility of their being very abnormal 

 specimens of L. fuscus. After giving his reasons j^ro and 

 con, he adds : " Still, I am convinced that your eggs are 

 L. marinus.'' 



On July 9th, Mr. Burkitt, the county surveyor, wrote to 

 me that on May 13tli, he, with a friend, Mr. Stoney of Monks- 

 town, went to the island in ((uestion, found an egg of apparently 

 L. marinus, watched the Gulls for some time, and tliat Mr. 

 Stoney was of opinion there were several pairs of L. marinus. 

 On May 29th, Mr. Burkitt alone paid a second visit to the 

 island, and found a nest of L. marinus with two eggs close to 

 the single egg observed on May 13th, but which had since 

 been sucked, and easily distinguished the parents through 

 their anxiety as to the nest and cliasing L. fuscus, their different 

 note, heavier flight, and great size. On tliis occasion he was 

 definitely sure of one ])air only. I submitted this letter to 

 Mr. Jourdain, who wrote me under date July 18th, 1911 : 

 " After the additional evidence you have now brought to light, 

 there is no doubt whatever that L, marinus breeds on Gay 

 Island." I may say that on various occasions I have thought 

 I have seen on this island and at other parts of the lake 

 L. marinus, and that in May, 1909, I found on the island a 

 Gull in a state of decomjoosition, and for\\'arded the head and 

 neck to my friend Mr. Pj^craft, who kindly identified them, 

 pronouncing them to belong to L. marinus. 



Herbert Trevelyan. 



[By a curious coincidenc3 the last number of the Zoologist 

 (September, 1911, p. 349) contains a note by Mr. R, Warren 



