32! 



PROTECTION OF THE LESSER TERN AT THE SPURN. 



T. FETCH, B.Sc, B.A., 

 Hcdon. 



The report of the Yorkshire Wild Birds Protection Committee 

 in the October ' Naturalist ' will be welcomed by all true 

 ornithologists for the promise of better things which this 

 year's work seems to convey- We have at last mastered the 

 proposition — an axiom to other counties — that all real bird 

 preservation must depend on private enterprise, and that no 

 county council will expend its funds, nor a rural policeman his 

 energy, on what appears to them merely a question of sentiment. 

 It seems ungracious to criticise, but I must suggest that the 

 watcher be employed solely for that purpose. Spurn presents 

 more difficulties than any other protected area I know of. The 

 length of the colony, the children living on the spot, the Grimsby 

 trippers, and the gravel diggers who walk from Kilnsea to Spurn 

 daily — all these make the watcher's task by no means an easy 

 one. In addition, we have to contend with a population 

 which has learnt thoroughly the lesson taught by unthinking 

 ' naturalists,' that every natural object has its price. Ento- 

 mology, as well as ornithology, has its resident collectors, 

 though they are not as numerous. It would be interesting to 

 ascertain the number of gun licences taken out in the district. 



The history of the protectorate during the last four years 

 furnishes examples of all the dangers to which the Tern are 

 exposed. In 1897 a watcher was appointed by the County 

 Council, but, unfortunately, he had very little to watch. The 

 spring-tides of June, known in Norfolk as the bird-tides, do not 

 attain the usual spring-tide level, and therefore do not cover the 

 Terns' nesting-ground ; but on this occasion they rose con- 

 siderably above their normal height, and the eggs and nestlings 

 of Tern, Ring Plover, and Lapwing were destroyed all along 

 the cast coast. I happened to visit a Norfolk breeding station 

 at the time of high water on 15th June 1897, and, having 

 'marked' a bird, walked up to the spot expecting to find the 

 nest. It was only alter three or four unsuccessful attempts that 

 We discovered that the bird was descending to the broken eggs 

 in the water. The Spurn colony of Sterna minuta is particularly 

 liable to be destroyed in this way, as the birds frequently lay 

 their eggs on ridges parallel to the Point. In uSqq the majority 

 ol the nests were on the top and western slope of such a bank, 

 iqoo November 1. w 



