198 THE SKUAS 



regular autumn and winter migrant to Great Britain, especially on the eastern side, 

 and a scarce visitor to Ireland on autumn passage. It has been observed during 

 the breeding season on the Murman coast, the Kanin Peninsula, Waigatz, Kolguev, 

 Dolgoi, and Novaya Zemlya (where nests were found in 1903), while in Asia it occurs 

 in summer on Yalmal, the Ob north of 67, the Lower Yenesei (where Popham found 

 nests in 1895), the Taimyr Peninsula north of 74 (Middendorff), and the Liakoff 

 Islands. It has occurred on Jan Mayen, but apparently does not breed in Spits- 

 bergen or Franz- Josef Land, though it has been met with in June north of the 

 Spitsbergen group between 82 53' and 82 57' N. lat. by Sverdrup. On the American 

 side it is found on the west coast of Greenland, and breeds in Wrangel Land, Grinnell 

 Bay, Exeter Sound, Disco Island (?), and Herald Island, while it occurs in summer 

 near Franklin and Liverpool Bays, and Mcllhenny took many nests in the Point 

 Barrow district, North Alaska. During the winter months it ranges south to the 

 Mediterranean and Black Sea, and has been recorded from the west coast of Africa 

 as far south as Walfisch Bay, while in the Pacific it visits Japan, Burma, North 

 Australia, Peru, and California. [F. c. R. J.] 



3. Migration. A bird of passage and a winter visitor. The species is 

 most often met with during the autumn : only a smah 1 proportion of the birds 

 remain for the winter near our southern coasts, and the spring passage is not very 

 noticeable. The east coast of Great Britain is the one most favoured by this 

 species ; on the Irish coasts it is of irregular occurrence. An exceptional invasion 

 took place in the autumn of 1879, and a less noticeable one in October 1880. After 

 gales the species is sometimes met with inland (cf. Saunders, III. Man. B. B., 2nd 

 ed., 1899, p. 689 ; and Nelson, B. of Yorks., 1907, p. 697). [A. L. T.] 



4. Nest and Eggs. Does not breed in the British Isles, [r. c. R. J.] 



5. Food. To a great extent parasitic on the smaller Gulls and Terns, forcing 

 them to disgorge fish and then devouring it. At times, however, it wih 1 capture fish 

 for itself, and will devour all kinds of carrion thrown up by the sea. It has been 

 recorded as feeding on the blubber and offal of whales, seals, walrus, etc., as well as 

 their excreta, also on lemmings captured by itself (Von Heuglin), and a dead rat 

 (Thompson). It has been seen devouring a dead herring-gull (R. Service), and has 

 been killed while clinging to a wounded kittiwake (M. Bailey). One shot by T. H. 

 Nelson disgorged a fresh grey-plover. Kolthoff records having found small Crustacea 

 in the stomach, and Naumann states that the berries of Vaccinium uliginosum and 

 V. oxycoccus are said to be used at times to feed the young. There is little doubt 

 that this species devours the eggs of other birds, and on the breeding-ground in 



