377 
THE GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL * 
Lams marinus , Linn. 
Is found around the coast throughout the year. 
A few only of this species appears to breed upon the coast of Ire- 
land. Mr. J. Y. Stewart, when living not very far distant from 
Horn Head, has known it to build on inaccessible places there, 
and once saw its nest on an insulated rock. More of the greater 
than of the lesser black-backed gull were said, by the gamekeeper, 
in 1832, to build there.f On the 9th of July, 1834, we saw 
several of the adult L. marinus about the lofty cliffs of Arran- 
more, off Galway Bay, and had no doubt of their breeding there. 
On the Kerry coast, a few nidify on the Magharee Islands, the 
cliffs about Dingle, and the small Skellig rock. J At Lambay Is- 
land, off the Dublin coast, three pair had nests in 1849.§ At 
various other localities a few pair must build ; but a very small 
proportion of those seen in autumn and winter upon our coasts 
can be bred in the island. || Without any reference to nidifica- 
* The only provincial name mentioned by Montagu is Cobh, which he says is ap- 
plied to the bird by the fishermen on the coast of Wales. This name is also used at 
Dublin, Wexford, Waterford, &c. Carrion gull and great saddle-back gull are names 
also in use. It is called in Sussex “ Parson Gull, from a supposed resemblance in the 
arrangement of its black and white plumage to the hood and surplice of a clergyman.” 
— Knox. 
f “ During a walk round all the cliffs of the Horn, on the 1st of August, 1850, 
the lesser black-backed gull was not seen, but several of the greater rose up from the 
abyss below, and soared above our heads.” — Mr. Robert Taylor, of Belfast. 
| Mr. R. Chute. § Mr. R. J. Montgomery. 
11 The breeding-places in Great Britain and the adjacent islands which I have seen 
named may be here brought together. They are “ Souliskerry, a small flat islet 
about thirty miles west of the Orkneys ” (Bullock) — in a few of the islands of Orkney 
and Shetland it breeds in abundance (Hewitson) — at the Bass Rock, Frith of Forth, 
a few pairs breed (Selby and Jardine) — on the South Stack, off Holyhead, two pairs 
breed (Stanley, ‘ Fam. Hist. Birds/ vol. ii. p. 244) — “ Steep Holmes and Lundy 
Islands in the British Channel ” (Montagu, as informed by fishermen) — about the 
estuary of the Thames, in Kent and Essex, it is a “ marsh breeder ” (Yarrell) — in 
islands on Loch Laighal, Sutherland (St. John, vol. i. p. 41). 
The gamekeeper at Islay, in 1849, considered that both the greater and lesser 
black-backed gulls breed annually at a rocky islet about half a mile to the north-east 
of Kinrevock — the great breeding-haunt of the common gull. 
