September, 1919] 



The Canadian Field-Naturalist 



55 



As a matter of fact, however, Pine lake, south-east 

 of Red Deer, is full of perch, averaging in weight 

 about three to the pound. The fish also occurs 

 in the reed-beds at Sylvan lake, the average weight 

 being from half to three-quarters of a pound. The 

 perch is a very fair table fish, and steps should be 

 taken to prevent the wholesale slaughter that some- 

 times occur at Pine lake. 



The foregoing notes include a number of species 

 of our most interesting and valuable fresh water 

 fish, and in concluding this paper I ask the question: 

 Do we as a people sufficiently appreciate our her- 

 itage in fishes, and realize with the rivers and lakes 

 of Canada at our disposal, the opportunities they 



offer (a) as food, (b) as a poor man's sport. Per- 

 sonally I do not think so upon the broad lines that 

 I have in mind, and I feel, with a view to the 

 generations to follow, that we should bestir our- 

 selves. It seems to me the necessary procedure to 

 be followed groups itself under three heads: 



1. Continually restocking rivers and lakes with 

 the best fishes native to such rivers and lakes — thus 

 insuring an increase and not a diminution in the 

 supply. 



2. Introducing into river and lakes the best fishes 

 adaptable (but not native) to such rivers and lakes. 



3. Prohibiting by legislation the polution of 

 rivers and lakes by untreated sewage. 



NESTING OF THE CASPIAN TERN IN THE GEORGIAN BAY. 



By W. E. Saunders, London, Ont. 



The Caspian is the largest of the three Terns 

 which the observer has a reasonable right to expect 

 to see on our waters. Until within a few years it 

 was supposed that the only nesting ground of these 

 birds in the Great Lakes was on some islands in 

 Lake Michigan, and I was, therefore, quite sur- 

 prised in June, 1909, when I found an adulf 

 specimen in the collection of Mr. Chris. Firth, at 

 Durham. It was still more surprising to be told 

 that this bird came from near Parry Sound where 

 it nested on an island in that portion of the 

 Georgian Bay. 



This information had come from Adam Brown 

 who is the lighthouse keeper at Red Rock light, 

 five miles from the Limestone Islands on which the 

 Caspian Tern has eventually been found to nest. 



The summer following my discovery of this 

 specimen at Durham, I had a letter from Pvof. Guy 

 Bailey, Geneseo, N.Y., inquiring where he could go 

 for some interesting Canadian bird work, and I 

 promptly detailed him for the hunt after the Caspian 

 Tern which he carried out with entire success. He 

 went to Parry Sound, made inquiry, and eventually 

 landed on Limestone Islands, where he took photo- 

 graphs of the eggs and young. 



I was not able to visit the locality until 1918, 

 when on June 4, Rev. C. J. Young, Brighton, 

 Ont., Mr. Edwin Beaupre, of Kingston, Ont., and 

 I reached Parry Sound in the afternoon and went 

 out with Mr. Dan Bottrill to Snug Island light- 

 house, some distance past the entrance to Parry 

 Sound bay. The next day being calm we traversed 

 the intervening ten miles to the Limestone Islands. 

 Caspian Terns were in evidence now and again on 

 this journey and indeed, are tolerably familiar birds 

 around Parry Sound harbor. When we came near 



the island we began to see them in considerable 

 numbers and mingled with them were Herring and 

 Ring-billed Gulls. The island on which the Cas- 

 pians nest is only slightly elevated above the lake 

 level with the exception of two places where mounds 

 rise to the height of about ten feet above the lake. 

 The chief mound, on and around which most of 

 the nests are found, is perhaps thirty yards across at 

 the base. The sides have a moderate slope and are 

 covered with grasses, but the top of the mound is 

 nearly bare of vegetation and the rock is breaking 

 into small scaly fragments. The other mound is 

 similar, but smaller, and the rest of the island, the 

 northern one, is only slightly elevated above the 

 level of the lake and more or less thickly covered 

 with grasses. 



Bare rock showed in a great many places in 

 large irregularly formed rectangles and in the cracks 

 between these rock faces grew the grasses which 

 outlined them. 



The two islands are connected at low water, but 

 we had to wade from one to the other and it took 

 us up to our knees and the footing was none too 

 good at that. 



On the southern island we imagined the nests of 

 Kingbirds, Yellow warblers. Song sparrows. Tree 

 swallow, Spotted Sandpiper and probably Black 

 Duck or American Merganser as these birds were 

 represented there, but there were no Terns' nests 

 on it nor any gull's except those of the Herring, of 

 which there were thirty or forty nests placed mainly 

 between the timber logs which had drifted up from 

 the low shores of the island and had been left high 

 and dry by heavy winds. 



Our interest centered, of course, on the Caspian 

 Tern, and as usual in cases of communal nestings of 



