DAPTION CAPENSIS. 



met with on the Antarctic continent itself. Captain Hutton gives the usual northern 

 limit of this Fulmar as Lat. 27° S., but individuals occasionally follow a ship to 24° 

 and even 17° S. Lat., which is farther north than is recorded by Layard and Gould ; 

 the latter observed it first in July, 1838, in Lat. 26° 54' S., and Long. 31° 20' W., and he 

 found it very plentiful till he doubled the Cape of Good Hope. Large numbers were 

 also seen off the island of St. Paul on August 18th, and in King George's Sound on 

 September Sth (Gould, Handb. Birds Austr., II., p. 470). 



Professor Giglioli on board the " Magenta " found it scarce in the South Atlantic 

 and Indian Oceans between February and April, but Sperling says that between the 

 Cape and Zanzibar it is the commonest of the large Petrels (Ibis, 1868, p. 293). During 

 the breeding season this bird is absent from the Cape Seas. In the Indian Ocean its 

 most northerly range is recorded by Mr. A. O. Hume, who mentions a specimen obtained 

 between Ceylon and Madras by Mr. Theobald (Ibis, 1870, p. 438). Professor Giglioli 

 states that D. capensis is abundant in the seas of Western Australia, from Lat. 37° 09', 

 Long. 108° 45' E., as far as the entrance of Port Phillip. The birds followed the ship 

 from New Zealand across the Pacific to Callao, and continued with it to the Straits of 

 Magellan, and thence into the Atlantic to Lat. 40° 40' S., Long. 55° 05' W. Cunning- 

 ham records it from Rio Janeiro, and Aplin from Banda Oriental, Lat. 34° 12' S., 

 Long. 54° 54' W. (Ibis, 1894, p. 212). Howard Saunders observed the species near 

 Valparaiso, and mentions that it ranges farther north than the Albatros. Other 

 localities recorded are Juan Fernandez and Mas-afuera Islands, and a specimen 

 in the British Museum taken off Payta, in Peru, is probably its farthest 

 northern range. Though it is supposed that the species nests in Tristan da Cunha, 

 we have no evidence that it does so, and Hutton points out that it was not mentioned 

 by Captain Carmichael (Ibis, 1865, p. 287). 



Lieutenant Harris did not find D. capensis breeding on Prince Edward or Kerguelen 

 Islands, but the first eggs were taken on the latter island by the " Challenger " Expedition, 

 and others more recently by Mr. Robert Hall. The bird was also found by Professor 

 Vanhoffen on the Crozets, Possession, Heard, and Bouvet Islands, in November and 

 December, also on Kaiser Wilhelm Land, Lat. 66° 2' S., Long. 89° 38' E. It has been 

 recorded from the New Zealand Seas, on Chatham, Campbell, and the Auckland 

 Islands, as well as on the Snares and Antipodes Islands, but though Hutton believed 

 that it nested on the two last no breeding places were found. 



In the South Orkney Islands an interesting account of the breeding of this species 

 is given by Mr. Eagle Clarke, and a good series of eggs was obtained by the Scottish 

 Antarctic Expedition, and Dr. Bruce further records it from the Weddell Sea as far 

 south as 71° 50' S. Dr. Pirie states that about 20,000 birds resorted to Laurie Island 

 for the purpose of nesting, and they were found in hundreds all along the coast. On 

 Saddle Island they also nested ; there the species is only a summer visitor, and is absent 

 from May till September, and only once was a flock seen flying northwards after April 



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