THE ZOOLOGIST 
No. 808.—October, 1908. 
A VISIT TO THE TERNERY AT WELLS-BY-THE-SEA. 
By Francis Heatueruey, F.R.C.S. 
(Puates II. & IIT.) 
On our arrival on June 14th both Common and Lesser Terns 
_ were beginning to hatch out. There were two distinct colonies 
of Lesser Terns—one in the shingle just above high-water mark, 
at a place called the East Point, by the side of an almost silted- 
up creek, and another about three hundred yards to the west on 
an old beach inland of the sandhills. According to Pat Cringle, 
who has succeeded his father as bird-watcher, and whom we 
found an intelligent and observant guide, there were about thirty 
nests in each colony. 
The Common Terns’ nests were scattered along about a mile 
and a half of the shore, most of them being amongst the marram- 
grass. When the first eggs were laid Cringle counted nine 
hundred eggs, and he estimated the total number of nests at the 
time of our visit at over one thousand. 
The Common Terns’ eggs laid amongst grass had a nest of 
grass; those laid among the pebbles often had a collection of 
broken cockle-shells, but this was not as markedly the case as 
with the Lesser Terns. Those laid in sand had nothing round 
them, and were the most difficult of all to see. 
The most peculiar nest we saw was one on an old mud-flat 
about two feet from a large patch of purplish-brown moss. The 
Zool, 4th ser. vol. XII.. October, 1908, 2F 
