126 CHARADRIIDjE. 



highway, though in passing the same place daily, during two 

 summers, not one ever appeared within a furlong of the spot. In 

 feeding by night also, they commonly (as proved by the cry) fre- 

 quent localities of this kind, where they are never known by day. 

 " When a flock of Oyster-catchers have been on wing for a 

 short time, they utter a peculiar brief note, so frequently 

 repeated, that it gives the idea of a general conversation, inter- 

 rupted occasionally by a whistle of longer duration.""* 



Montagu remarks, that " in winter they assemble in small 

 flocks;" an observation commonly repeated by subsequent authors; 

 but in Belfast bay, they are associated for three-fourths of the 

 year ; indeed at all times : even to some extent, in the breeding 

 season — after that period they muster again at the beginning of 

 August.t A favourite haunt in the bay is a very extensive 

 mussel-bank, near Garmoyle, from being commonly seen feeding 

 on which, these birds have received the name of mussel-peckers, 

 which, here at least, is much more appropriate than c^er-catcher ; 

 as the Ostrea inhabits too deep water to be ever accessible to them. 

 The contents of the stomach or gizzards (which latter are as fully 

 developed as in graminivorous birds) of eight sea-pies, shot in 

 various parts of the bay in spring, autumn, and winter, proved, 

 on examination, to be as follows : — Five contained only the 

 opercula and portions of the animal of the whelk {Littorina com- 

 munis), with which some of them were wholly filled; — one ex- 

 hibited merely the opercula — about forty in number — of Purpura 

 lapillus, and of all sizes, from the smallest to the full grown : 

 another (shot on Nov. 13) presented a good deal of vegetable 

 matter, consisting of tender roots and green leaves ; also small 

 white worm -like larvse; a few opercula of the whelk, and an 

 operculum of the buckie {Buccinum undatum) ; — in the crop and 

 stomach of the last, which was remarkably fat, were found fifty 



* Mr. J. R. Garrett. 



f I did not see any of these birds about tbe island of Islay during the month of 

 January 1849, and was told that they always leave it and the neighbouring islets in 

 autumn. They return early in the year, and breed in numbers on the shores. Many 

 of their eggs were found on the Rabbit Island off Ardimersy, from the middle to the 

 end of May 1848. 



