( 312 ) 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



MAMMALIA. 



Grey Squirrel in Northamptonshire, — I have seen a Grey Squirrel 

 which was shot about December 30th, 1915, at Weston, near Tow- 

 cester, Northamptonshire. This is sixteen miles N.W. of Whaddon, 

 where I saw one the previous May ; and as it is less than five miles 

 from the Oxfordshire border, I suppose we shall get this undesirable 

 in the county before long. — 0. V. Aplin (Bloxham, Oxon). 



Do Rats Eat the Eggs of Poultry ? — It is a very common belief 

 that Eats will remove the eggs from the nests of Poultry and eat 

 them, and one can get plenty of book and verbal evidence of the 

 ways and means by which the eggs are removed, and that egg- 

 sucking by Rats is very frequent. And yet in no single instance have 

 I been able to obtain information that is satisfactory and not hearsay, 

 .and I have often questioned farmers and poultry-keepers on this 

 point, but in vain ; and I have never known an instance in years of 

 personal experience in keeping poultry. That the habits of these 

 vermin may vary in different localities is quite possible, and I should 

 be glad of any satisfactory proof upon this question. That Eats do 

 destroy Chickens and Ducklings, etc., I am only too well aware. — 

 J. Steele Elliott. 



AVES. 



Reported Nesting of the Gannet in Orkney. — In the ' Zoologist ' 

 for last year (p. 433) I published the report of a pair of Gannets 

 nesting on the Horse of Copinsay in 1911 (not 1911 as printed). I 

 am now sorry to say that further inquiries have thrown some doubt 

 on the statement, which seemed reliable at the time. I am informed 

 that in an Orkney newspaper in that year the fact was noticed that 

 one pair had nested for the first time. But another resident, living 

 on that side of Orkney, who has been in the habit of visiting the 

 birdcliffs of Copinsay for many years, in answer to my inquiries 

 va-ites as follows: "No Solans ever laid on the Horse of Copinsay, 

 but half a mile away is the island of Copinsay, with about three- 

 quarters of a mile of cliffs, averaging 200 ft. in height, where tens of 

 thousands of birds (i. e. other rock-birds) lay. Some fifty years ago 



