THE HERRING-GULL. 361 



But nearly all the birds we then see are immature. A few hours 

 after visiting the Gobbins, on the first occasion named, a small 

 flock of these came under my notice far up Belfast Bay. When 

 at Strangford Lough, on the 21st of June, a rather Mrge flock 

 of immature gulls of this species was seen on one of the islands : 

 — a bird which was shot proved to be one of the preceding year. 

 On the sands near the Middle Island of Arran, off Galway Bay, 

 a large flock exclusively of immature birds was observed on the 

 9tli of July, 1834. But on the same day of the month of the 

 preceding year I saw, by the aid of a telescope, at the mouth of 

 the river Bann, a very large flock, which appeared to be in one, 

 two, three, and four years old plumage. 



With respect to young birds, it struck me as singular that so 

 late in the season as September 23rd (1849), when Mr. R. Ball 

 and I were walking on the road skirting the sea for two miles 

 southward of Newcastle (county Down), a large number of these 

 birds, all in the same stage of immaturity, and in flocks of from 

 five to fifteen, kept flying in succession in the same track above 

 the rocks in a northerly direction ; — they flew in perfect silence. 

 So early in the season as the 30th of July, 1845, during a walk 

 of two miles from Belfast on the western side of the bay, I 

 remarked that gulls were numerous as in winter : I reckoned 

 130 together, and there were several smaller flocks — in the largest 

 body were numbers of birds not less than herring-gulls, and 

 which seemed even larger; there were certainly three species. 

 On the 19th of September this year immense flocks, consisting, 

 it was believed, of thousands of these birds (described as 

 not less than herring-gulls, and apparently larger), were seen by 

 the three chief wild-fowl shooters in Belfast Bay : anything like 

 such numbers had never been observed here before. " They flew 

 southward like wild geese the same day.''' For a week afterwards, 

 numbers of flocks, consisting of hundreds, remained, but became 

 gradually scarcer until all were gone southward. This is the 

 only instance known to me of gulls appearing here in flocks on 

 migration; and it is an interesting fact that not a single bird 

 in these flocks of hundreds and thousands was adult ; — they ap- 



