Field Notes. Ill 



Young Qrey Seal caught at Hornsea. — In The Field of 

 January I2th, 1918, p. 70, Mr. P. I. Pocock, of the London 

 Zoological Society, reports a Christmas gift of a very young 

 Grey Seal ( Halichcenis grypus) to the Society, by a Hull fish 

 merchant, Mr. G. T. Witherwick. Mr. Pocock points out that 

 the Society almost invariably receives its Grey Seals from the 

 Western coast of Great Britain ; the Common Seals [Phoca 

 vitidina) on the other hand, coming from the Eastern coast 

 and from the South coast of England. He therefore deduces 

 that this baby Grey Seal will probably have travelled from 

 the ' Shetland Islands, where the species is known to breed.' 

 Mr. Pocock has evidently overlooked that there is a well- 

 estabhshed and breeding colony of Grey Seals off the North- 

 umbrian coast — on the outer group of the Fame Islands. The 

 Grey Seal differs from the Common Seal in the large size (and 

 weight) to which it attains, and also in the elongated muzzle — 

 {i.e., dog-faced) and also in its dentition — a difficult matter to 

 verify in most mounted specimens ; but a very dangerous one 

 to attempt with the living animal — even if only a baby. But 

 the chief scientific difference, and in my opinion the only 

 justifiable reason for placing it in a separate genus from 

 Phoca, is that it brings forth its young at a most unseasonable 

 time of the year, viz., in October and November.* But with 

 the exception of this colony of Grey Seals on the Northi mbrian 

 coast, the Common Seal is undoubtedly the Seal of our Eastern 

 coasts. Twenty to twenty-seven years ago I have many 

 times watched the Common Seals in scores in the Wash, more 

 particularly in what is known as the ' Boston Deeps.' Their 

 round heads, just above the water whilst watching, appeared 

 almost exactly like cannon balls, and I was assured by many 

 reliable friends that they bred regularly in early summer on 

 the Lincolnshire coast of the Wash ; but of this I was never 

 able to afford the time for an ocular demonstration. Mr. T. 

 Sheppard, M.Sc, tells me that Mr. G. T. Witherwick informs 

 him this young Grey Seal was caught at Hornsea. Therefore 

 the record that a young Grey Seal, which Mr. Pocock computes 

 as not being more than a month or two old, being caught so 

 far south on the Yorkshire coast as Hornsea in December, is 

 worth being placed on the records of the Yorkshire Naturalists' 

 Union. — H. B. Booth, Ben Rhydding. 



o 



The Museums Journal for January contains an article on 'Attempted 

 Usurpation of the British Museum ' ; a report on ' Local War Museums,' 

 by Messrs. F. R. Fowley and T. Sheppard, and a paper on ' Transparent 

 Preparations of Animal Tissues by the Spalteholz Method,' by Mr. R. H. 

 Burne. 



* Mr. Edmund Selous has published in this journal for 1915, some very 

 detailed and valuable observations on the breeding habits of this species. 



1918 Mar. 1. 



