188 BLACK-HEADED GULLS IN ESSEX (1899).
a sort of broken caw, another a long drawn or screaming caw,
and sometimes when they swooped down at me, a note like a
small dog's bow, wow, wow."
GULLERY NO. 3.
The next Gullery, No. 3, in Hamford Waters, was I con-
sider a decided find, as it is I believe an entirely fresh one, and
promises to be the most vigorous of the three.
Hamford Waters with its islands, weird stretches of mud
covered with sea aster, its decaying remnants of old sea walls,
its lagoon like waters and intricate channels, must always have a
great fascination for the naturalist, and thither I next set sail.
" On July 12th, 1899, having navigated the somewhat
narrow entrance to the Waters, I anchored off Pewit Island and
landed in the dinghy to inspect. It was high water, and I found
the island inside the destroyed sea walls, a vast sheet of water,
the sea pouring over the walls in a great cataract, and the lone
farmhouse rising bare and deserted in the midst of the tidal
waste.
" Only some posts and a knoll or two rose above the surface
of the lagoon, so that my hopes that the island would become a
bird nursery must now be entirely abandoned. There were
immense flocks of gulls and sea fowl of all sorts and kinds in
sight, but they were there to feed and not to breed.
" Not far away, however, on another island or insulated
salting by the help of my glasses I discovered some more of my
friends, and rowing up in the dinghy, a great flock of Black-
headed Gulls immediately rose in a cloud, making a great noise.
In all I should put them down roughly to a little under a
hundred birds.
" Quickly having landed (as the tide was falling) I found
myself on a large salting, on the highest points of which and just
above high water mark, spring tides, I soon discovered over
twenty nests. They were very untidy loose constructions like
those on the saltings by Brightlingsea, a few dead reed stalks
and old straws laid on the thick matted grasses and sea-sedge,
some with only a few fragments and others somewhat larger.
" All the eggs were evidently hatched, as I only found one
nest with two eggs ; indeed one could see the young birds in the
distance fully fledged and swimming about in the water, jealously
watched by their respective parents, who were apparently tempt-
ing them to fly or teaching them where to look for food. One