The California Murre 



into a vertical position, the feet are extended to the utmost to act as 

 brakes, and the head is thrust forward as much as possible to guide these 

 operations, which are imperfectly correlated at best. Occasionally, a 

 bird fails to effect a landing with ease, or at least fears failure, whereupon 

 it turns instantly and glides downward upon extended wing, preparatory 

 to a new trial. 



As we finally withdraw and the timorous ones come back, there is a 

 ferment of readjustment on the ledge. Lost chicks pipe shrill inquiry of 

 every bustling matron, and if mistaken, are received with spiteful jabs 

 from bills as sharp as thorns. When, after much adversity, the right 

 mother is found, the chick is promptly thrust between her legs, where the 

 accommodations seem ridiculously inadequate. Fortunately, the chicks 

 are not required to remain for long in this bedlam nursery. At an early 

 age they are conducted — carried according to some authorities — to the 

 water. Here they take up in high spirits the herculean task of conquering 

 the mighty deep, and we know little more of their life history until they 

 are ready to haul out again in the following, or perhaps in the next suc- 

 ceeding, spring. 



The California Murre's notes consist chiefly of a mumbled and apolo- 

 getic ow ow, or a louder arry of protest ; but occasionally the birds explode 

 in stentorous kerawks, absurdly out of character with their mild eyes. 

 The name arra, which is applied to a closely related species in the North 

 Pacific, is manifestly imitative. 



Scattered colonies of Murres exist all along the coast-line as far south 

 as Prince Island (off San Miguel), but their aggregate population is 

 trifling in comparison with the northern colony, which for unknown genera- 

 tions has maintained itself upon the Farallons. 



In the palmy days antecedent to the arrival of the gold seekers, these 

 Farallon rookeries, or, more properly, loomeries, rivaled those of Alaska 

 in importance. But the Argonauts brought keen appetites. Food was 

 scarce in the early days, before agriculture had been developed. The 

 presence of so much easy meat at the mouth of the Golden Gate was not 

 likely to be overlooked. By 1850, the robbing of the Murre ledges had 

 become systematic, and the Farallon Egg Company, the famous "egg 

 trust," was formed for the purpose of supplying the San Francisco market. 

 That the venture was a financial success there can be no doubt. Dr. 

 Heermann, writing of the situation in the early Fifties, says, "The traffic 

 in the eggs from this place to San Francisco and inland reaches the value 

 annually of between one and two hundred thousand dollars". 1 According 

 to another authority "more than five hundred thousand eggs were sold 

 in less than two months in 1854 — a 'l collected in one limited portion of 



1 Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv., Vol. X., pt. IV., No. 2, pp. 75, 76. 



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