BIRDS. 



345 



found on the West Sands of St. Andrews Bay on the 9th September 

 1881, and was acquired by the authorities for the old Museum at 

 Perth, and is now in the present Perth Museum. 



marus glacialis {L.). Fulmar. 

 Rare. Occasional occurrence. 



One was obtained off the rocks at Johnshaven in the winter of 

 1895, and none have been seen or heard of since by Mr. D. Towns. 



One was labelled "West Sands, 18th Sept. 1868," and is in the 

 St. Andrews Museum. 



06s.— Eeferring to the allusions to the supposed increase and direction of 

 the dispersal of this bird at its nesting place in my last volume {Fauna of the 

 North- West Highlands and Sicye), I desire to add a note in this place. Since 

 I wrote that article I have had occasion to refer to an old journal, dated 1894, 

 and as the remarks made have some bearing on the same subject, I quote them 

 here. "When sailing homewards in the yacht Daydream from Faroe, Mr. 

 Andresen— owner of three sloops and old yachts in Faroe, who desired to 

 work his passage to this country in connection with his own business, and 

 who had told me many things about Eockhall and his experiences as a sailor 

 and fishing-smack owner in those seas — mentioned that, when he was a lad, 

 'there was an acknowledged scarcity of Fulmars, and an actual decrease.' 

 From his own personal knowledge he spoke of Myggenaes— the westernmost 

 island of the Faroe group — as the only, or almost the only, breeding station 

 at one time, ' but at the present time the Fulmar is universally distributed, 

 though not perhaps in great numbers in any one place.' This widespread but 

 scattered colonisation is due to the nature of the cliff faces." 



The same question arises as that asked by me before, viz. Have these 

 British occupations of recent years been populated from surplusages from St. 

 Kilda, or from a returning host falling back upon old haunts from a more 

 general distribution and natural expansion from more northern latitudes ? 



Though not directly connected with Tay area, still, in continuance of 

 previous remarks about this species in past volumes of the series, I desire to 

 mention that a somewhat new departure in its dispersal has come to be 

 noticed by Mr. R. Godfrey. On his return route from St. ^Kilda in mid- 

 summer 1905, in the Dunara Castle, via Barra Head and the sound between 

 the Treshnish Isles and Tiree, no less than nine individuals of these birds 

 were seen on the course between Barra Head and the shallow fishing bank, 

 which has been referred to in our volume on Argyll and the Isles as very 

 rarely visited by single birds of the species. I hope it is not necessary to repeat 

 that Mr. W. Donald, purser on board the Dunara Castle steamer, who has 

 traversed these seas as long as I can remember — say since I first went out to 

 the Outer Hebrides in the old Dunvegan Castle steamer, belonging to Messrs. 

 Orme and Co., in 1871, and in the Dunara Castle ever since — has known and 

 seen perhaps more Fulmar Petrels in his life than all the " trippers " who have 

 visited St. Kilda in all that time, and is one who has always been in the 



