240 BIRDS. 



grouse taking the heather at once. We may as well state here 

 that, as long as the skuas keep to their own ground, Mr. 

 Moodie-Heddle does not allow them to be interfered with, as he 

 is a strict preserver of all wild birds and beasts, as long as they 

 do not unduly increase, and thereby do damage to others. 



In Sanday, Mr. Harvey writes us, Kichardson's Skua is seen 

 in spring and autumn. 



In a paper on Orkney birds written by Salmon (1831), 

 for London's Magazine already referred to, under " Arctic Gull " 

 that gentleman says : " This we observed on every island, but 

 their principal breeding places were Hoy and Eday." Per- 

 sonally, we could obtain no certain information of their having 

 bred anywhere else than in Hoy. 



Stercorarius parasiticus (.). Buffon's Skua. 



Apparently a very rare visitant to Orkney. One was obtained in 

 June 1849, by Hubbard in Sanday, eating worms. This in- 

 stance is recorded in a MS. note left by the late Robert Heddle. 



On June 16th, 1881, a fine pair of these birds was shot in 

 Orkney, and sent to Sergeant Sandison, Wick, for preservation ; 

 they are now in the possession of Mr. W. H. Doeg, Manchester. 

 They were wrongly described by Mr. W. Reid, in Land and 

 Water, as Gull-billed Terns. 



[Obs. Mr. John Begg, Stromness, informed us that the 

 Buffon's Skua once bred in Hoy, and Mr. Moodie-Heddle kindly 

 interviewed Mr. Begg for us, and has sent us the following 

 statement : 



" Begg, however, described the bird very closely, the ex- 

 treme length of tail and the wing looking narrower when 

 flying and the bird somewhat smaller. He said this flight was 

 so different from the Richardson's Skua, that any one who was 

 accustomed to birds, and had once seen them, could pick them 

 out easily by that alone." 



" He compared its flight to that of a Peregrine Falcon. He 

 said he thought it would be about thirty-five years ago since 

 they made their appearance about a dozen of them, I understood 

 him to say and they bred for four or five years on the wettest 



