408 



10 



herbs of various species. In some localities the nest is placed in flat situations, whereas in 

 others, as in Shetland, it is almost invariably built in cliffs of difficult access. As above stated, 

 it often builds in trees on the American coast, though I cannot find any record of its having 

 been observed nesting thus in Europe. Mr. A. Benzon informs me that on the Danish coasts it 

 " breeds on the small islands, where its eggs are collected by the fishermen, and often form no 

 inconsiderable source of food. Its nest consists of a hole scratched in the ground close to the 

 shore, in which, from the early part to the middle of June, three eggs, measuring from 65 by 45 

 to 75 by 51 millimetres, are deposited. Judging from a large series, I should consider the average 

 size to be 71 by 49. A peculiarly elongated variety measures 90 by 48 ; and several unusually small 

 eggs vary from 40 by 30 to 57 by 41 millimetres." 



I found it breeding on the flat shores of the small islands off the coast of Finland. 



In my collection I have a considerable series of eggs of this Gull, which in size vary from 

 2fo by Ifo to 3^- by 2^ inches. In colour they vary from brownish grey to dull olive-brown, 

 marked and spotted with violet-grey underlying shell-blotches and dark brown overlying surface- 

 blotches and spots. I have one almost unspotted pale blue variety ; and Mr. Benzon informs me 

 that he has several such abnormal eggs, as also others spotted with brown. In some varieties 

 the markings are very closely diffused over the egg, giving it a very dark appearance. Three is 

 the number of eggs usually deposited. 



Mr. C. B. Hodgson sends me the following notes on the breeding of this Gull : — " In the 

 Orkneys it lays its eggs on the grass-covered edges of the higher cliffs, many hundreds breeding 

 together on the Black Craig near to Stromness. At this place the nests were placed very near 

 to each other, and a pair or two of Lesser Black-backs were breeding with them. Whenever I 

 have found the Lesser Black-back breeding — on Suleskerry, on the Orkneys, and on the different 

 islands of the Farn Group — I have always seen a pair or two of Herring-Gulls in company with 

 them, different though the usual nesting-places of these two species are. The eggs of the 

 Herring-Gull, in colour, vary from a moderately light stone to a dark brown of a somewhat 

 yellowish hue ; but the average colour is a moderately dark stone-colour. They are blotched 

 with very dark brown, the blotches being rarely large, but of a medium size, and, as a rule, 

 uniformly distributed over the surface of the egg ; mingled with the blotches are a few spots. 

 Mr. Hewitson says that the chief characteristic, distinguishing the egg of this bird from that of 

 the Lesser Black-back, is that the blotches are larger. This I have not found to be case ; and of 

 the seventy eggs of each species now lying before me, the blotches on those of the Lesser Black- 

 back run larger on the average. Though taken singly, the eggs of the two species cannot be 

 distinguished with any certainty, yet, when a series of each is placed side by side, there appears 

 little difficulty in saying to which bird the eggs belong. Those of the Herring-Gull are more 

 uniform in colour, in shape, and in the markings. They are darker, lack the delicate appearance 

 presented by many of those of the Lesser Black-back, and are not so thickly covered with spots 

 or blotches. In some few instances they bear a close resemblance to the eggs of the common 

 Skua, a resemblance I never saw in any one of the thousands of the eggs of the Lesser Black-back 

 I have examined on the Farn Islands. The greenish tinge in the ground-colour I have found 

 absent in those I took in the Orkneys, whilst it was common in those of the Lesser Black-back I 

 took both on those islands and on the Farn group. 



