1905-1907.] 511 



" NUPTIAL CHANGE IN PUFFIn's BILL." 



The usual Wednesday evening meeting was held in the 

 Museum, College Square North, on 13th March, when a paper 

 was read by Mr. Robert Patterson, M.R.I.A., on " The Nuptial 

 Change in the Bill of the Common Puffin." The chair was 

 occupied by Mr. Nevin H. Foster, M.B.O.U., Vice-President. 

 After referring to the opportunity that these informal Wednes- 

 day meetings afforded the members of the Club to bring for- 

 ward subjects for discussion that would not occupy the whole 

 evening, Mr. Patterson proceeded to state that his paper was 

 based on a translation of an important article by a French 

 ornithologist, Dr. Bureau, who had the satisfaction of being the 

 iirst to witness and describe the extraordinary moult in the bill 

 of the puffin that takes place early every season. By means of 

 diagrams the various horny pieces that drop off the bill after 

 the breeding season is over were clearly shown. For many 

 years ornithologists were of the opinion that there were two 

 species of puffins — one of which was found here in Summer, 

 breeding in large colonies, and that had a large and rounded 

 bill, and the other which was only found on sea beaches after 

 severe storms, and in which the bill was very much smaller, 

 quite a different shape, and not so brilliantly coloured. Dr. 

 Bureau was able to show by the production of specimens from 

 the islands of the coast of France that by the dropping off of 

 nine homy plates of the bill the one species merged into the 

 other, and that the second supposed species was merely the 

 puffin in Winter plumage. Mr. Patterson concluded by drawing 

 attention to the fact that it was not necessary to travel to foreign 

 lands to make important zoological discoveries, and he urged the 

 members of the Belfast Field Club to further exertions in the 

 investigation of the fauna and flora that lie at our doors. The 

 diagrams were excellent, especially one drawn and coloured to 

 nature by Mrs. Patterson, and which showed the nine parts 

 composing the bill of the puffin during the breeding season. 

 The following joined in the discussion at the close of the 

 lecture: — Mrsw Patterson, Messrs. Nevin H. Foster, Hugh L. 

 Orr, W. J. C. Tomlinson, George Donaldson, and W. H. Gall- 

 •^ay — after which Mr. Foster announced that a new species had 



