Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 3 (1899).djvu/94

70 the first of the Kvalö lakes; another pair had two young on the sedgy pool where the Red-necked Phalaropes were breeding.

Phalacrocorax carbo.—Cormorants were seen on July 23rd on the rocks and skerries off Svolvaer.

Anser cinereus.—We did not actually meet with Grey-lag Geese, but, to judge from their droppings, they frequent the boggy margins of the forest pools on Tromsö Island. The pinioned Grey-lags in the courtyard of the Grand Hotel at Tromsö are said to have come from Karlsö.

Anas boscas.—One seen at a pool on Skjervö, another at the Kvalö lakes. A duckling which we caught on the 19th close to the water-lily pool above mentioned was probably of this species.

Somateria mollissima.—Eiders were common about Tromsö and the neighbouring islands, but we saw only ducks with their young broods; the drakes appear to prefer more open water. On July 14th there were many off Grindö. One party numbered five old birds and about twenty young; another duck had five, and yet another four under her charge. On the rocky point at the northern end of the island we found two young in the down washed up; they may have been killed by the big Gulls. A maternal Eider grumbled "og og" as a Great Black-back settled beside her brood. There was a nest in a hollow amongst the rocks with the down still in it; others amongst the rocky knolls, or just within the birch wood, had been cleared out, and were now mere hollows. A boy showed us a nest by the shore; the bird was sitting in a little stone shelter, from which she bustled clumsily out. There were only two eggs; one taken was on the point of hatching. On the morning of the 17th, as we walked to a rocky point near Lyngseidet, many Eiders swam out from the shore with their broods. It was very common to see two old ducks with five young ones between them: very many had none. Next day, at Skjervö, I noted two old birds followed by fifteen young ones, no doubt the produce of a couple of nests which had not been discovered; we found one such still full of down on the less frequented side of the island. At Svolvaer semi-domesticated Eiders swam in the harbour amongst the boats, close under the hotel windows. When returning in the 'Sirius,' we lay to for some time at Kobberdal, on the island of Lökta, to take on board three hundred barrels of herrings. Close to us was a small islet