STORMY PETREL. 
PllOCELLARIA PELAGICA. 
This active little sea-bird may be seen (that is, if you can catch a glimpse of it), at one season or another, 
off every portion of our coast-line, round the whole of the British Islands, It is as well to state that I have 
had but few chances for making observations on their habits ; a visit was paid, during the latter part 6f May 
1868, to Eura, a small, rocky, uninhabited island off the west coast of Ross-shire, where they were declared to 
breed by the natives resident at the fishing villages on the mainland. The holes and the scratchings in the soil 
to which they resorted were examined, though not a bird could be found, and it was evident our exploration 
of their haunts had been undertaken a week or two before their arrival at their breeding-quarters. In the 
North Sea, while in company with the herring-fleets in autumn, I have often seen a few; and during, as well 
as after, the gale of November 1872 they were abundant off Great Yarmouth and all along the Norfolk coast. 
In the Channel, and especially off the shores of Sussex, they are exceedingly numerous during spring, and may 
be occasionally met with in autumn. This is all the information I can give concerning their distribution 
around our islands from personal observations, and few, if any, authors on ornithological subjects appear to be 
able to say much more from their own experience. 
Several writers have stated that the appearance of the Stormy Petrel is, as its name would denote, an 
indication of bad Aveather and gales at sea ; this is certainly a mistaken idea, as, Avutli only a gentle breath 
of air, and the surface of the water almost as smooth as glass, the birds may be attracted to the spot if 
a small quantity of fish-liver is thrown overboard. The smell of the oil that then disperses through the air 
draws them from all quarters, to which it is carried in the space of a fcAV minutes. I first heard of this 
manner of bringing the Petrel Avithin range from a Brighton boatman, while fishing off the Black Pi,ock, a 
favourite feeding-ground for the finny tribe, in the autumn of 1870 ; as AA^e Avere busily engaged in hauling 
up the rock-AA'hiting and other denizens of the deep*, a single bird AA'as detected hovering round, though 
sheering off before the gun could be picked up and brought into use. The boatman declared that at times 
any number might be shot if some fish-liver Avas on board and a feAV small pieces flung out. Luckily a 
quantity happened to have been stoAved aAvay, and some small pieces having been dropped on the water, Ave 
anxiously aAvaited the result ; shortly after, the bird Avas again flitting round, and, offering an easy chance, 
was procured. 
During the spring, Avhen this species is gathering in the Channel, and on the whole of our coast-line, before 
making a move to their northern breeding-stations, they are to he found almost every day that an attempt is 
made to ascertain their Avhereabouts. 
* A three-bearded reckling, a rare and very beautifully marked and coloured fish, was taken that day, the first I ever caught, and no others 
were met with till I obtained a couple off Shoreham in September 1882 — the first, captured on the 4th of the month, weighing 2 lbs., and the second 
a week later, bringing down the scales at 1| lb. Both of these fish were exhibited at the International Fisheries Exhibition in London, in 1883, 
by Mr. Gunn of Norwich, to whom I sent them, not being a collector of the finny tribe myself. 
