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I, however, received an adult bird and a young bird of the year, shot in the harbour at Alderney in August of that year, and those are the only Channel Island specimens of the Cormorant that I have seen. Professor Ansted includes the Cormorant in his list, and marks it as occurring only in Guernsey and Sark. There is no specimen at present in the Museum. SHAG. Phalacrocorax graculus, Linnaeus.
The flocks generally consist mostly of young birds of the year; the fully adult birds, however, though fewer in number, are in sufficient numbers to make a very fair show. Professor Ansted includes it in his list, but only marks it as occurring in Guernsey and Sark; it is, however, quite as common about Herm and Alderney. There is no specimen at present in the Museum.
The Quail breeds occasionally, too, in Alderney, as the bird-stuffer and carpenter had some Quail's and Landrail's eggs; these he told me he had taken out of the same nest which he supposed belonged originally to the Landrail, as there were rather more Landrail's than Quail's eggs in it. Professor Ansted includes the Quail in his list, but marks it as occurring only in Guernsey.
The Sedge Warbler is not mentioned by Professor Ansted in his list, and there is no specimen of either this or the Reed Warbler in the Museum. DARTFORD WARBLER. Melizophilus undatus, Boddaert. French, "Pitchou Provencal," "Bee-fin Pittechou."
Professor Ansted includes the Kittiwake in his list, but only marks it as occurring in Guernsey and Sark. There are two specimens in the Museum, an adult bird and a young one in that state of plumage in which it is the Tarrock of Bewick and some of the older authors.
As far as Alderney is concerned Captain Hubback, R.A., who has been quartered there at different times, says he has never seen one there; but I do not think he has been much there in the early autumn. Professor Ansted includes it in his list, and marks it as occurring in Guernsey and Sark. There are several, both male and female and young, in the Guernsey Museum.
Professor Ansted has only mentioned one of the family the Great Skua, Stercorarius catarrhactes, in his list, which also may occasionally occur, as may Buffon's Skua, Stercorarius parasiticus; but neither of these seem to me so likely to occur as the two first-mentioned, not being by any means so common on the English side of the Channel.
There being no trout or salmon to be protected in Guernsey, the Dipper has not to dread the persecution of wretched keepers who falsely imagine that it must live entirely by the destruction of salmon and trout ova, though the contrary has been proved over and over again. Professor Ansted includes the Dipper in his list, but only marks it as occurring in Guernsey.
I have never seen it in either of the other Islands, though no doubt it occasionally occurs both in Sark and Herm, if not in Alderney. Professor Ansted includes the Red-backed Shrike in his list, and marks it only as occurring in Guernsey.
In Alderney there were a great many nests about Scott's Hotel and a few more in the town, but I did not see any about the cliffs as at Fermain and Petit Bo in Guernsey. Professor Ansted includes it in his list, but only marks it as occurring in Guernsey and Sark. SAND MARTIN. Cotyle riparia, Linnaeus. French, "Hirondelle de rivage."
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