RETURN TO LIBRARY OF MARINE BIOLOGICAL LABORATORY WOODS HOLE, MASS. LOANED BY AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY The Annals OF Scottish Natural History A QUARTERLY MAGAZINE WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED Naturalist EDITED BY F.Z.S. J. A. HARVIE-BROWN, F.R.S.E., MEMBER OF THE BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION JAMES W. H. TRAIL, M.A., M.D., F.R.S., F.L.S. PROFESSOR OF BOTANY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN AND WILLIAM EAGLE CLARKE, F.L.S., MEM. BRIT. ORN. UNION NATURAL HISTORY DEPARTMENT, MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND ART, EDINBURGH 1896 EDINBURGH DAVID DOUGLAS, CASTLE STREET LONDON: R. H. PORTER, 7 PRINCES ST., CAVENDISH SQUARE LIST OF PLATES I. Map illustrating the Distribution of the Tufted Duck. II. Colonel H. M. Drummond Hay. III. Young Gray Lag Geese. IV. Delavalia Giesbrechti^ sp. nov., and Idya minor, sp. nov. Aim. SCOT. NAT. HIST. 1896 PLATE 1. i Shetlan . n ~ s.es ,. , GoUitesN Eof Orkney^ Fairl." MAP OF KIRKCUDBRIGHT TO ILLUSTRATE MR HARVIE BROWN'S PAPER ON THE TUFTED DUCK GLAND 1896 IRISH S E J Baslttolofrirwt Co fa/r Faunal Areas thus County Boundaries thus Scafe of English Miles O IO 2O 30 *O SO fOO DATES = f/>t Records of Breeding, > = Resident Distribution x = Breeding, First Dates unknown. North of lot. 56 rare at all seasons on West Coast. The Annals of Scottish Natural History No. 17] 1896 [JANUARY UNCOMMON CETACEANS IN SCOTTISH SEAS. By JAMES SIMPSON, Anatomical Museum, University of Edinburgh, THE COMMON DOLPHIN (Delphinus delphis) IN SHETLAND. ON the 5th of February 1895 I received a telegram stating that a specimen of this uncommon species had been captured in Urafirth Voe, and, instructed by Sir William Turner, secured it for the Anatomical Museum of the University of Edinburgh. It proved to be a male, was 5 feet 8^ inches in length, and its skeleton now forms part of the Cetacean collection in the University Museum. Regarding its capture, Mr. Thomas Anderson, Hillswick, " writes : A little boy eleven years old saw it splashing in the shallow water at the head of Urafirth Voe. He ran clown with his father's stick and hooked the crook into the blow- hole, and so hauled it as far as he could. He says he then felled it with a stone, and got his sister to help him up with it, as all the men were at sea." [This species does not appear to have hitherto been recorded for the British coasts north of the Firth of Forth on 17 B 2 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 1 2 the east coast, or north of Isle of Mull on the west coast. And though it is said to occur off the Scandinavian and Greenland coasts, its precise range in the Northern European Seas has still to be ascertained, for it has to some extent been confounded with allied species. It is not uncommon in the Atlantic, except the north, being frequent on all the coasts of France, and occurs now and then in the English Channel. Regarding its presence in the Seas of North- Western Europe, Van Beneden doubts its occurrence in the high north and the shores of Greenland, and remarks that it is positively rare on the coasts of Scotland and Denmark, and that it is also rare in the North Sea. According to Lilljeborg and Reinhardt, however, it is occasionally met with on the coasts of Denmark and Norway. ED.] BOTTLE-NOSED WHALE (Hyperoodon rostratus] ON THE SOUTH-EAST COAST OF SCOTLAND. Since the publication of Sir Wm. Turner's account of this species in Scottish seas (" Proc. Roy. Phys. Soc.," I 885-86, vol. ix.), the following specimens have occurred. A specimen about 26 feet long was stranded 2^- miles to the west of Bo'ness, on the south shore of the Firth of Forth, on the 1 2th October 1895. Eight days afterwards I saw the animal lying on the shore, but it was so much mutilated that I could not make out the sex from external appearances. On the morning of 1st November 1895 a young female, i 5 feet i o inches long, was found dead on the shore, perfectly fresh, about a quarter of a mile east of the Red- heugh Coastguard Station, and 4^ miles eastward from Cockburnspath, Berwickshire. Except the belly, which was of a dark gray colour, the rest of the animal was black. It was advertised for sale by the Receiver of Wrecks of H.M. Customs, but failed to find a purchaser. It will therefore be cut up and buried near where it came ashore. In March 1894 a male specimen of H. rostratus, not quite so long as the above, was stranded at Grangemouth, Firth of Forth. 1 "Trans. Roy. Phys. Soc. Edinb.," vol. ix. p. 346. 2 "Ann. Scot. Nat. Hist.," 1893, p. 112. THE TUFTED DUCK IN SCOTLAND 3 THE TUFTED DUCK IN SCOTLAND ITS INCREASE AND DISTRIBUTION. By J. A. HARVIE-BROWN, F.R.S.E., F.Z.S. PLATE I. As introductory to the direct subject of this paper, we propose to give some idea of the Continental and English and Irish distribution of " this species. This we have taken from Saunders' excellent Manual " of British Birds (1889). There we find that the Tufted Duck is said to have bred in the Faeroes, and is found in small numbers in the rivers and lakes of Norway in the summer months, becoming more abundant in Sweden, Finland, and Russia. Southward it nests in suitable localities down to about lat. 50, while over the rest of Europe it is found on migration and in winter. In summer it frequents the temperate regions of Asia. In England a tolerable and increasing number remain to breed with us, and nowhere more abundantly than in Nottinghamshire. Nests have also been found in Yorkshire, Lancashire, Northumberland, Norfolk, Sussex, Dorset, and some other counties which afford suitable resorts. In Ireland it annually frequents Loughs Neagh and Beg, and some waters in County Monaghan in summer, being generally distributed in winter. It is not necessary for us to go very far back in our annals in order to trace the history of this species in Scotland. To preserve, however, some uniformity in our method of treating this and similar " subjects, we refer first to the Old Statistical Account of Scotland." In the case of the Tufted Duck we do so only in order to record the negative evidence, because no passage therein can be said to refer " " directly to the species. But in the New Statistical Account we find a few very few references as far north as Argyle in the parishes of Killean and Kilchenzie (vol. vii. p. 381) and parish of Ardchattan (p. 482), which, as will appear later, is an early date for our west coast, and at that time they were in all probability first winter pioneers. An almost as early date, however, comes to be noticed here, viz. : Thompson (" Birds of Ireland," vol. iii. p. 147) "saw a few of these birds (some of which were adult males) frequenting two small lakes on the moor above Ardimersy Cottage, in the island of ' ' Islay, where they are well known by the name of douckers.' This was in the month of January 1849. The older authors are unanimous in their opinion that the Tufted " Duck was only a winter visitor to Scotland, and that it probably bred in the Arctic regions." Also their records make it apparent, although it was a regular winter visitor to the coasts and estuaries of England, it only was seen in Orkney and Shetland after severe weather. Few of 4 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY these authors refer to it as even frequenting inland waters, Selby, how- ever, speaking in more general terms of its distribution in 1832. Mac- Gillivray, twenty years later, only speaks of it as "arriving in October " and departing in April," and adds : Beyond the Firths of Clyde and " Tay becomes of less frequent occurrence (" Water Birds," vol. iv. p. 125). MacGillivray also repeats the assertion that "it retires to the Arctic regions to breed, although some, according to M. Temminck, remain in the temperate climates." " The above remarks, as regards its probably breeding in Arctic " " regions and only appearing in the northern districts of Britain after " severe weather," although a regular winter visitor to the coasts and estuaries of England," does not seem a strong argument in favour of its high- Arctic origin; and Temminck's remark appears to us of as rather an Eastern distinctly value, indicating origin ; and we think this is borne out by the sketch of its Continental distribution as given by Mr. Saunders, and by the observations of other naturalists who prior to the date of MacGillivray's remarks and accentuation of earlier writers, such as Fleming, Jenyns, etc. have left their records. 1 " Coming now to the date of Gray's Birds of the West of Scotland" (1871), the Tufted Duck is [spoken of as occurring in great abundance in the Clyde during winter, but as rare in the Outer Hebrides, though seen there occasionally in autumn and winter " cit. he : In (loc. p. 387) ; and adds very severe winters the Tufted Duck is much more frequently obtained than in open seasons," and " limited numbers are also shot on some of the inland lochs and ponds from October to March." Nothing, however, in the text of Gray's book is said as regards any having remained anywhere to breed but in a note in his own in interleaved ; pencil handwriting, my copy, the nest taken in Fifeshire and the two instances in Perthshire are referred to (1875, 1876, and 1878).