TllKlK KC'OXO.MIC' RKLATIONS TO TIIK AOU I ( T I/l'l ’ U 1 ST 
17 
THE HERRING GULL AND COMMON TERN. 
The gull family was mentioned in Circular 32 as a group bene- 
ficial to farmers living in a prairie country. At the time, we re- 
ferred particularly to tlie Clack ITrn so abundant in many of our 
prairie sloughs, as a catcher of grasshoppers and, while no illus- 
tration of this l)ird is available, we are pleased to be able to pre- 
sent an excellent drawing of the Common Tern in this ])ublica- 
tion which wdll serve to illustrate the group. 
'The Herring (full — a good scavenger u])on the shore of lake 
or ocean, typifies the larger members of the family and the species 
itself, wdiile not as abundant perha|)S as other gulls which breed in 
some of our lakes — is, nevertheless, a Minnesota summer resi- 
dent, arriving in the southern part of the state early in April, 
shortly after that w^orking its wuiy north, where S(^me at least 
nest in our larger lakes, notablv Lake Mille Lacs. I have ob- 
served them at Devils Lake, ( )tter Tail County, in (October and 
also find the following observations amongst mv notes taken some 
years ago: “At Lake Mille Lacs, after the wdnd has been blow'- 
ing from the East a day or more, these gulls and the two follow- 
ing species, namely L. delcivarciisis and L. Philadelphia, are plenty 
along the w'^est shore, dying u]) and dowm the beach and occa- 
sionally alighting to ])ick up small lacustrine mollusks w^ashed 
ashore with the weed matter. x\bout two miles from the south 
shore of the lake lie three barren, rocky islands, which are fre- 
(luented by the gulls in the breeding season. The larger of the 
three, called Steme Island, — or S])irit Island by the Indians — con- 
