AVES STERCORARIID^E. 23 1 



about us, uttering their harsh, scolding cries, and several times, when 

 walking by myself, they swooped at me in such a menacing manner that 

 I was obliged to make them keep their distance by striking at them with 

 my stick. The common brown duck of the Strait swam in flocks close to 

 the beach, and the kelp geese ( Chlcephaga antarctica) were almost equally 

 bold. The upland geese (Chlcephaga magellanicd] were plentiful, and 

 allowed the sportsmen to approach within a few yards of them without 

 taking alarm, and a pair which I disturbed in one' spot ran along in front 

 of me without taking the trouble to fly off. I observed several specimens 

 of a large owl, and two species of hawks, one a dark-coloured bird, which 

 I had not seen in the strait, the other coloured much like a kestril, but 

 about twice the size of that bird. One of the latter flew about so close to 

 me that I threw my stick at it once or twice, and on one of these occasions 

 it cooly lighted on the missile as it fell to the ground. I have already, I 

 think, remarked on the much greater tameness of certain species of birds 

 at the Falkland Islands, as compared with the same kinds in the Strait, a 

 circumstance which, perhaps, may be partially accounted for by the greater 

 scarcity of foxes in the former locality." (Cunn. Nat. Hist. Str. Magell. 

 1871. pp. 296-297.) (Falkland Islands.) 



The habits of this Skua are dwelt on by H. N. Mosely, and a few 

 extracts are here appended. (Notes by a Naturalist on the "Challenger," 

 pages 123, 131, 174, 190, 254 (1879). 



Inaccessible Island, Tristan da Cunha, October, 1873. "I went along 

 the beach, and through a second wood towards the waterfall, where was 

 the hut of the Germans, and their potato ground. A flock of thirty or 

 forty predatory gulls (Stercorarius Antarcticus], were quarrelling and 

 fighting over the bodies of penguins, the skins of which had been taken 

 in considerable numbers by our various parties on shore. The Skua 

 is a gull which has acquired a sharp curved beak, and sharp claws at the 

 tips of its webbed toes. The birds are thoroughly predaceous in their 

 habits, quartering their ground on the look-out for carrion, and assembling 

 in numbers where there is anything killed, in the same curious way as 

 vultures. 



"They steal eggs and young birds from the penguins when they get a 

 chance, but their principal food here appears to be the night birds, espe- 

 cially the Prions, which they drag from their holes, or pounce on as soon 

 as they come out of them. The place was strewed with the skeletons of 



