TURNSTONE. 3 



wet appearance of the newly-turned portions of the masses of drifted weed making 

 them evident enough to an observant eye. Although this bird mostly frequents 

 rocky shores, the sands, during stormy weather or immediately afterwards, appear 

 to be very attractive. 



" Thomas Edmondston, seeing this bird in the north of Shetland at all times 

 of the year, considered it resident ; and though he never heard of the eggs being 

 found, he seems to have been correct in his supposition. As long ago as 1859 a boy 

 brought me some eggs from Woodwick, among which were two which were so like 

 those of the Turnstone that I always considered them as such, although unwilling 

 to label them, as the finder could give no account whatever either of buxls 

 or nests. For years after this I was sadly tantalized by seeing Turnstones 

 about the shores of Unst during the breeding season, — not small flocks, which 

 merely waited until summer was well advanced, but pairs, which lingered 

 about particular localities. It was seldom, however, that the pair were seen 

 together ; the male might be feeding upon the beach and the female several 

 hundred yards away upon the rough stony ground. The most likely place of all 

 seemed to be between Skioting and Clugan, and to this spot I directed my 

 attention more particularly. It was a peculiarly wild spot, quite out of the way 

 of the people's track to and from their cottages and boats, and, so far as I could 

 imagine, well suited to the breeding habits of the birds. The ground is rough 

 and quite uncultivated, backed by stony hills, and gradually sloping towards 

 masses of weather-worn rocks, which form a barrier preventing the encroachments 

 of the sea. Where the vegetation gradually ends, the ground is very irregular 

 and stony, tufts and patches of long rank grass apparently offering most suitable 

 nesting-places. On the evening of the 16th of June, observing a female Turnstone 

 behaving very suspiciously, I searched most minutely among the grassy depressions 

 and hollows for more than two hours, and was wandering, almost in despair, upon 

 the gravelly and stony edge which had been washed bare by the winter's spray, 

 when, to my delight, there lay three eggs in a hollow among the stones, slightly 

 sheltered from the north by a flattened fragment which partly overhung them. 

 The hollow, Avhich had evidently been artificially formed, was scantily lined with 

 dry grass, and measured a little less than five inches across. I was rather 

 surprised that the bird displayed no anxiety; possibly she was watching me 

 from some concealed position, and would have been bolder had all four eggs 

 been laid and incubation commenced ; but at any rate I saw nothing of her for 

 about an hour previously to my discovery of the treasure. Although I had not 

 the smallest doubt that the eggs were Turnstone's — indeed they could have 

 been nothing else — I thought it best to take one egg, intending to return 



o 



