THE BLACK-HEADED GULL. 327 



So late as the 31st of May and 2nd of June, 1832, I observed 

 flocks consisting of various numbers, not exceeding tliirty, about 

 the Lagan. 



On the 24th of July, 1838, I remarked many old birds accom- 

 panied by their young of that season in the bay. In 1845 they 

 were still earlier, a flock of about tliirty, old and young, being 

 seen there on the 19th of July, and on the 24th, about twice 

 as many. At that locality, and in the tidal portion of the 

 river Lagan opposite the Royal Botanic Garden, they gradually 

 increased until the 8th of August, when their numbers were com- 

 plete for the autumn. 



Prom the river Lagan they used to be wholly absent from the 

 period of their retirement, late in the spring, until old and young 

 returned in company. I was therefore surprised to see a flock of 

 forty-nine fly high above the Lagan bridge early in the evening 

 of the 15 til of May, 1850, all adult birds, and followed by two 

 or three smaller flocks proceeding seaward, in the si\me course, 

 most probably to their breeding- haunt. Many adults, I was 

 told, were daily observed in the bay from this time forward. 

 On the 4th of June I remarked a number of old birds in a similar 

 place in Lancashire ; — the marine sands about Fleetwood : and 

 on the 2nd of July, about forty in that state of plumage appeared 

 in a flock at a locality of the same nature between Drogheda 

 and Dubhn. Their wandering far from breeding-haunts, in the 

 midst of the season, would therefore seem to be not unusual, un- 

 less that such birds — like adult kittiwakes, hereafter to be men- 

 tioned^do not increase their species. 



'Plumage. — I shall give a selection from notes on this subject made in the vicinity 

 of Belfast. 



1833. March ^Xst and \st of April. Out of a great number observed, not more 

 than about one in twenty had the head black ; the others had it faintly mottled, or 

 exhibited merely the black ear-spot of winter ;* the rest of the head being pure 

 white. April VMh. Of two which flew within a few yards of me, both having the 



* The other dark spot of winter plumage, being close to the eye, is not conspicuous 

 like that above the eai's. 



