I08 SEA-BIRDS 



place that the end to which the unfortunate birds come is a particularly 

 sticky one and horrifying and nauseating to all humane people. At 

 all recent ornithological congresses, and nearly every international 

 meeting for bird preservation, the existence of this problem has been 

 discussed, debated, and hundreds of recommendations have been 

 made by scores of bodies to scores of governments, many of whom have 

 given assurances and promises. However, these words have not saved 

 the sea-birds, who still continue to die in large numbers round our 

 shores. In Britain we have the Oil in Navigable Waters Act of 1921, 

 which has been observed as carefully as possible by all shipping 

 plying to British ports. However, there have been recent occasions 

 upon which it is obvious that this Act has been grossly ignored, and 

 during the war a number of tankers were torpedoed and wrecked, 

 with consequent effects upon the auks. Unfortunately one big discharge 

 of oil will pollute the sea for a very large area and for a very long time. 

 It is rather interesting to note that the auks, in particular the 

 guillemot and razorbill, are among the few common British sea-birds 

 in which a decrease has occurred during the present century. This 

 decrease must not be exaggerated, and it has not been noticeable in 

 all parts of Britain. One of these noticeable decreases is on Ailsa Craig 

 in the Clyde, which lies on a main shipping route. J. A. Gibson (1951) 

 thinks that the present population of not more than 5,000 pairs of 

 guillemots is about one-tenth of what it was forty years ago. In 

 1937 one of us found 61 auks, most of which were guillemots, and 22 

 gannets on Ailsa's two-and-a-half miles of coast-line, incapable of 

 survival, so thickly were they 'oiled'. But the experience of Gibson in 

 1948 was far more harrowing; on 23 August, along but half a mile 

 of beach, he counted eight hundred and fifty badly oiled guillemots 

 ashore and many hundreds floating a little way out at sea. There were 

 hundreds more round the rest of the coastline of the island — all due 

 to die. This was nearly a quarter of the breeding population of the 

 Craig. He illustrates the general decline in the guillemot's fortunes 

 on Ailsa Craig by the following interesting figures from parts of the 

 bird-cliffs known as Ashydoo (A) and the Bed o' Grass (B) : 



A B Total 



Average yearly 'bag' of eggs in the 



years 1905-10 1,080 1,320 2,400 



Number of apparently incubating 



pairs in 1950 240 c.2^0 r.500 



Gibson thinks that the present population (5,381 pairs in 1950) 



