180 LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN DIVING BIRDS 



them, and so drives them into a heap, and thus has an opportunity of snatching 

 here one and there another, as it finds it convenient to swallow them, and if 

 any one pushes out to escape, it falls the first prey of the devourer." 



The murre also feeds on shrimps and other crustaceans, marine in- 

 sects, and other soft-bodied animals which it finds in the sea. Mor- 

 ris (1903) says that it feeds "on sprats, young herrings, anchovies, 

 sardines, and other fish, mollusca, testacea, and sea insects." 



Behavior. The murre's flight is swift, direct, strong, and pro- 

 tracted, accomplished by steady, rapid wing beats. When traveling 

 long distances it flies in flocks high in the air, but when moving about 

 near its feeding or breeding grounds it flies close to the water with 

 frequent turnings from side to side. It is so heavy bodied and small 

 winged that it can not rise off the water without pattering along the 

 surface. In flying from a cliff, it glides rapidly downward at a steep 

 angle, sweeping in a long curve outward and into a level course. 

 Its momentum is so great in proportion to its wing area that, in 

 alighting on a ledge, it has to approach it in a long upward curve 

 and check its speed by flattening its body, spreading its feet and 

 "back peddling" vigorously with its wings; even then it alights far 

 from gracefully. I found that with practice, one could learn to 

 distinguish the common murre in flight from either the razor-billed 

 auk or the Brlinnich's murre, even at a considerable distance. The 

 razorbill is the shortest and most compact; the common murre is the 

 longest and slenderest and the Brimnich's murre is intermediate 

 between the other two in that respect. The common murre usually 

 carries its head and neck well stretched out and somewhat below 

 the level of its body, whereas Briinnich's carries its shorter neck 

 nearly straight and the razorbill still more so. 



In diving the murre flops under with its wings half spread, using 

 both wings and feet, or perhaps only the wings, in the rapid sub- 

 aqueous flight necessary to capture the small fish on which it feeds. 

 Mr. Edmund Selous (1905) writes: 



Whilst watching the guillemots (common murres) on the ledges, one of them 

 flew down into the sea, just below, which was like a great, clear basin, and thus 

 gave me the first opportunity I have yet had of seeing a guillemot under 

 water. It progressed, like the razorbill and puffin, by repeated strokes of its 

 wings, which were not, however, outspread as in flight, but held as they are 

 when closed, parallel, that is to say, roughly speaking, with the sides, from 

 which they were moved outward, and then back with a flap-like motion, as 

 though attached to them all along. Thus the flight through the water is man- 

 aged in a very different way from the flight through the air. 



Although much of the murre's food is obtainable near the surface 

 or at moderate depths, it must occasionally dive to considerable 

 depths, for Mr. J. H. Gurney (1913) states that Mr. William Leckie 



