THE LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL. ^ 



" In Hoy [in the Orkneys] any one," writes Mr. Moodie-Heddle to Harvie-Brown, 

 " can create a breeding place of the Lesser Black-backed Gull by burning a large 

 tract late in the season ; the Gulls then come on the bare ground (through the 

 following summer and autumn) to catch moths and winged insects, which have no 

 heather left to go down into. They then usually begin to breed on the tufts of 

 white moss left unburnt the following season. The breeding places by the water 

 of Hoy and down to Pegal Burn, were thus formed by accidental fires. No Gulls 

 bred there for many years before, and we could kill sixty or seventy brace more 

 Grouse." In lona, Mr. Graham notes that this Gull made its nest on the flat 

 marshy summits of all the lesser islands. The nest is sometimes on the bare 

 rock ; but more often on a grassy slope if such exist near. The most remarkable 

 situation for a nest, perhaps, is that cited by Dr. Sharpe, which was placed in the 

 middle of a sheep track, and the sheep, in passing to and fro, had to jump over 

 the back of the sitting bird ! This nest (with its four eggs) is now in the British 

 Museum. 



This species breeds in colonies, which in some places are very large, when 

 their nests are placed so close to each other, that it is by no means easy to traverse 

 their nursery without treading upon either the eggs or young. The nest, if on 

 the ground, is little more than a scraped out hollow in the ground, lined with 

 grass, sea- weed, or herbage of any kind within reach ; if on a rock a larger pile 

 of the same substances, is built up in the selected niche or ledge. It is not at all 

 uncommon to find the Herring Gull nesting in close proximity to it, only, however, 

 in the more inaccessible ledges or summits. Three eggs are laid as a rule four 

 occasionally, sometimes only two which vary very greatly in size, shape and 

 colour. Many of them are hardly, if ever certainly, to be distinguished from those 

 of the Herring Gull. They vary in size from at to 3 inches in length, by if to 

 2 in diameter. Ground colour from very pale grey, through olive-brown to 

 greenish-blue or chocolate-brown, spotted and blotched, often more abundantly at 

 the greater end, with black or dark brown. From the end of May, through June 

 and into July, eggs and chicks of all stages and ages may be found. 



After about three weeks incubation the chicks break through their prison, as 

 lively and nimble balls of down, greyish-buff above, with the head, neck and 

 back spotted with brown ; the under side paler and unspotted. On the least 

 intrusion on their cubicle they are ready to be off running, as Mr. Battye remarks, 

 head down and shoulders up like a Falcon to the nearest herbage or water for 

 security ; but if left undisturbed they may be found for a fortnight or more in 

 the nest, most assiduously tended by the parents. The approach of any intruder 

 when the helpless young are in the nests, is the signal to set the whole of the 



