NOTES AND QUERIES 55 



BIRDS. 



The Black Guillemot on the Solway Firth.— In ' The Zoologist ' for 

 October last, Mr. J. J. Arinistead records (p. 295) the capture of a Black 

 Guillemot on the Solway Firth, and states that it is only the second 

 specimen he has seen there in seven years. It is certainly a species of 

 considerable rarity within the actual limits of the Firth (that is within a 

 line drawn betwixt Balmae Head and St. Bees), and I can only add two 

 occurrences to that of Mr. Armistead's. Both of these were defunct 

 examples noticed amongst the Common Guillemots, Razorbills, and Puffins, 

 which at times strew the Solway shores — victims of some mysterious 

 epidemic or more than usually severe storm, which now and again has 

 destroyed these birds in thousands. Outside the Firth proper, but still 

 within the Solway area, I do not think the Black Guillemot is so rare as is 

 generally understood. I have been informed on reliable authority that it 

 is pretty regularly seen at the breeding-place of the Common Guillemots at 

 the Ross at the mouth of the Dee. The last time I was at the Scaur 

 Rocks, which lie at the entrance to Luce Bay, midway betwixt Burrow 

 Head and the Mull, a pair of Black Guillemots flew about during the 

 three or four hours I was on the Big Scaur. The time was the last week 

 in May, and I formed the strong opinion that this pair of Black Guillemots 

 was nesting there. I know that towards the west of the Mull the Black 

 Guillemot is an almost daily visitor in summer, and it would be strange if 

 this were not so, for the species breeds at Ailsa Craig, and also at Rathlin 

 Island, while it is generally understood that there is still a small breeding 

 colony on the Isle of Man. — R. Service (Maxwelltown, Dumfries). 



Introduction of Red Grouse into N.W. Germany.— In the illustrated 

 German sporting journal, ' Der Waidmann/ of the 13th October last, Count 

 Kuiphausen gives an account of his attempts to introduce Red Grouse from 

 Scotland upon his domain in East Friesland, where an extensive tract of 

 heather seemed to favour such an experiment. He says : — " In the autumn 

 of 1891, I ordered from a game-dealer in England five pairs of live Grouse 

 for my game-preserves near Wittmund in East Friesland, as an experiment 

 in the way of naturalising this foreign game-bird with us. My prospects 

 regarding this attempt did not appear to me unpromising, as I could offer 

 the birds on my sporting domain freedom from disturbance, plenty of 

 water, heather, and various berry-bearing plants, and patches of buck- 

 wheat, to all of which these birds are said to be partial. The Grouse 

 were transported across the North Sea in November. They were sent 

 from Scotland via London and Flushing, the consequence of which 

 was that, by reason of the long railway journeys, the birds suffered 

 very much, and succumbed, chiefly, I fear, from want of water — at any rate, 

 I only received one pair alive on their arrival at their destination. I had 

 taken pains beforehand to erect for them, in a thicket, an aviary of wire^ 



