Page:Polar Exploration - Bruce - 1911.djvu/143

Rh the most plentiful and characteristic species is the Black-throated penguin (Pygoscelis adeliæ). This species is common to every Antarctic seaboard that explorers have yet visited. The Scotia naturalists estimated that, on Ferrier Peninsula alone, which was for two or three miles simply alive with these birds, there were not less than two millions. Altogether, in Laurie Island, South Orkneys and its off-lying islets, no less than fourteen rookeries were known, besides the Ferrier Peninsula rookery. The favourite sites for these communities were on rocky places near the sea, where small stones abounded, and these were sometimes occupied up to 500 ft. above sea-level. As the season advanced these rookeries became indescribably dirty, being masses of mud, with pools of filth, and the birds themselves became correspondingly defiled.

At the rookeries in Scotia Bay the first signs of nest-building were noted (1903) on October 10th. By the 20th nearly all were paired, and the appearance of an unpaired bird gave rise to a fearful commotion, every bird trying to get a billful of feathers from the unhappy one, while all the penguins in the vicinity raised their voices and screeched their loudest.

The appearance of such wanderers, too, generally resulted in a free fight among those around.