MR. A. H. PATTERSON ON YARMOUTH NATURAL HISTORY. 
455 
XIV. 
NATURAL HISTORY NOTES FROM YARMOUTH. 
By A. H. Patterson. 
Read joth April , 1912. 
The year 1911 provided me with few items of any great 
interest or moment. The hot summer and autumn were 
characterised by an almost utter absence of bird life on 
Breydon. Nor were the conditions favourable from a marine 
point of view : I have to record but one new fish for the year, 
viz., the Sandy Ray. 
In January there was a great inshoring of Cods, when 
numbers were taken from the piers. I examined many 
stomachs, finding lugworms, shore crabs, and hermit crabs 
in abundance. Undoubtedly the hermits are usually shaken 
out of the whelk-shells before swallowing, whilst those 
engulphed are ejected immediately a crab dies and becomes 
detached from them. 
A Streaked Gurnard ( Trigla lineata) reached me from 
Lowestoft, January 31st. During the latter part of the 
month small Dorys were much in evidence. 
Bramblings had been plentiful during the winter. 
Harvest Mice. This small rodent would appear to be 
plentiful in East Suffolk. Two were sent to the Tolhouse 
Museum in February. 
Hawfinches had been numerously seen, and several nested 
in February in the neighbourhood of Filby. 
On April 14th Breydon marshes and walls were alive with 
small beetles, mostly Staphylina, and a species of black fly 
(Adora?). Starlings were “hawking” for them like so many 
Swallows. Drowned insects floated on the tide in great 
numbers. 
