188 BIRDS OF GUERNSEY. 



marauding Herring Gull during the absence of the 

 parents. The Shag assumes its full breeding- 

 plumage and crest very early ; I have one in perfect 

 breeding-plumage, killed in February ; and Miss 

 C. B. Carey mentions in the 'Zoologist' having 

 seen one in Mr. Couch's shop with its full crest in 

 January. I do not quite know at what time the 

 young bird assumes adult plumage, but I have one 

 just changing from the brown plumage of the young 

 to adult plumage. Many of the green feathers of 

 the adult are making their appearance amongst 

 the brown ones ; this one I shot on the 26th June, 

 1866, near the harbour Goslin, at Sark, near a large 

 breeding- station of Shags and Herring Gulls : if it 

 is, as I suppose, a young bird of the year, it would 

 show a very early change to adult plumage, but of 

 course it might have been a young bird of the 

 previous year ; but, as a rule, young birds of the 

 previous year are not allowed about the breeding- 

 stations, any more than they are by the Herring 

 Gulls. 



The Shag is included in Professor Ansted's list, 

 but curiously enough only marked as occurring in 

 Guernsey. There are two adult specimens and one 

 young bird and one young in down in the Museum. 



162. GANNET. Sula bassana, Linnaeus. French, 

 " Fou de bassan." The Gannet, or Solan Goose, 



