VOL. vn.] NOTES. 145 



June, 1913 {antea, p. 118), is especially interesting, as it 

 tends to confirm what I myself observed in 1912, a report 

 on which appears in Vol. VI. (pp. 158-9) of this magazine. 

 Last year I missed the birds altogether after August 8th, 

 but this year they have remained ofE the North Wales coast 

 during the whole summer and are still here (SeptemlDer 6th), 

 though compared with last year they do not appear to be 

 quite as numerous. Regularly each evening flocks, large 

 and small, comprising black and brown birds, may be seen 

 from the Great Orme's Head, winging their way from the 

 east and passing to the west where, off the Anglesey shores, 

 they spend the night, only to return the following morning 

 to their feeding- grounds in Liverpool Bay. This year I 

 noticed the first flocks on June 22nd, the same date on which 

 they were first observed in 1912, though this may be nothing 

 more than a coincidence. Richard W. Jones. 



BREEDING-HABITS OE THE STEGANOPODES. 

 In his paper on the Steganopodes, pp. 94-100, Mr. Jourdain 

 cites my mention of the earliest eggs of the Shag [Phalacrocorax 

 g. graculus) known to me in 1900, as having been seen on 

 April 6th. I have since been favoured with an earlier record 

 by Mr. F. Hyde Maberly, of Beechmount, Crosshaven, co. 

 Cork, who has written : " 29th March, 1908.— On the 23rd 

 inst. (March) I took three fresh Shag's eggs from a nest on 

 a cliff ledge at Robert's Head, getting within a few feet of 

 the bird before putting it off. There were three Shag's 

 nests nearly finished at the same place on March 4th." 



As the Shag nests in sheltered places — such as dens in 

 boulder-clay, hollows under fallen masses of rock, ledges in 

 the mouths of caves, and on the lower parts of overhanging 

 cliffs — ^it is more likely than the Cormorant to escape observa- 

 tion, and to lay early : as the Puffin, which lays in holes, 

 breeds earlier than the Guillemot, which lays on open rocks. 



R. J. USSHER. 



In view of Mr. Jourdain's article on the nesting of the 

 Steganopodes, in your last number, it may be interesting 

 to state that the Cormorant seems to be an earlier nester 

 than the Shag in the Scilly Isles. During my visit to the 

 islands towards the end of May, 1911, the only colony of 

 Cormorants which I came across was on the island of 

 Maleggan, on May 22nd, and here all the nests contained 

 young, varying from fully-fledged birds almost ready for 

 flight to naked nestlings only a few days old ; whereas 

 Shags' nests, which were extremely numerous on all the 

 islands, still contained eggs, no young at all being seen— r 



