566 PUFFINID^E 



found on a ledge, in the interstices of large, irregular rock- 

 masses, or sometimes in a hollow in soft soil on the face 

 or slope of a cliff. In many cases no building-material is 

 used, the eggs resting on the bare soil or rock ; but fre- 

 quently dry vegetation and small fragments of stone form 

 a lining. 



Dr. Wiglesworth observed that " when the nest was 

 placed amidst bare rocks, it was very usual to find the 

 shallow cavity lined with these little flat pieces of stone, 

 often mere flakes, which had obviously been collected by 

 the bird ; but when the nesting cavity was formed on the 

 herbage-covered ledges and grassy slopes, the tendency to line 

 the cavity with these flakes of stone was not so pronounced, 



although still apparent 



This tendency, indeed, to line 



the nesting cavity with small fragments of stone seems to 

 be the most characteristic thing about the Fulmar's nest " 

 (' St. Kilda and its Birds,' pp. 64, 65). 



The single egg is white in colour, marked in some cases 

 with a few minute reddish spots. The shell is of a coarse 

 granular texture, and has a peculiar, persisterit, musky 

 smell. 1 



Incubation, in which both sexes take part, begins about 

 the middle of April. 



This species has many breeding-resorts round the north- 

 west coast of Scotland, chief among which may be men- 

 tioned St. Kilda, where, in Soay especially, it nests in great 

 numbers ; in the Shetlands it has spread considerably of 

 late years, as also in the Hebrides. 



Mr. Eagle Clarke states that "the extension of the range 

 of the Fulmar to Fair Isle and the Western and Northern 

 Isles of Scotland, as well as to the north coast of the 

 mainland, may be due to the congestion that has probably 

 taken place in St. Kilda, which until a quarter of a century 

 ago was its only native British habitat. During recent 

 years the human population of St. Kilda has markedly 

 decreased, and this, taken with the fact that the people are 

 no longer dependent on the Fulmar for food to the same 

 extent as formerly, has led to fewer of these birds being 

 killed, and hence a considerable increase in their numbers 

 would naturally result, and the seeking of new haunts 



Dried skins retain this odour for many years. 



