NOTES—ORIGINAL AND SELECTED.
299
headed kind. But several pairs of the lesser black-backed gull have appeared,
and stayed all the summer through on certain marshes. It is believed that these
birds have returned and bred there.
" The oyster-eaters have been seen nesting in a fresh locality, and the shell
ducks, the largest of all shore fowl, are reported to have bred. Shooting shore
fowl, which is an ancient Essex industry, is not allowed till August 15, which
saves the birds being murdered by Bank Holiday trippers. Suffolk should come
into line on this point, for it is absurd to be protecting birds on August 1 at
Harwich, while they are allowed to be shot across the river at Felixstowe."
FISHES.
A Salmon in the Blackwater.—A salmon weighing 41/2
pounds has been found in an injured condition in the river
Blackwater, at Kelvedon, Essex, but how it reached so far in-
land is a mystery. That portion of the river where the salmon
was discovered is leased by the Gresham Angling Society, and
the theory most favoured by the members is that it came up the
Blackwater on the last big flood. Kelvedon is many miles from
the estuary of the Blackwater below Maldon, and the salmon
would encounter several weirs and mills in its ascent to the
higher reaches. Years ago occasional salmon were caught in
the nets in the tidal portion of the Blackwater, but a specimen
of this fish has never been seen before in the river at Kelvedon.
The Times, April 12th, 1904.
Why Fish is Scarce.—The increasing scarcity of fish
in the North Sea is attributed by Mr. H. Donnison, the Eastern
Sea Fisheries Inspector, to the sufferance of the natural enemies
of fish. In the Wash, which is a great fish nursery, there are,
he says, in his half-yearly report, hundreds of seals, tens, if not
hundreds, of thousands of gulls, beside cormorants, all living on
fish, of which a cormorant alone can eat seven pounds daily. As
these destroyers prey chiefly on small fish, enormous havoc is
caused among fish which otherwise would find their way into the
fishermen's nets. Of shell-fish, for example, Mr. Donnison
states that the gulls consume far more in an infant state than
are taken by fishermen in an adult state.
MOLLUSCA.
Limax cinereo-niger Wolf., in Essex.—This slug, which
has not been recorded previously for the Eastern Counties, is
common in Epping Forest near High Beach. It has also been
found near Staples Hill, Loughton, and in "Cook's Folly,"
Walthamstow.—T. Petch, Leytonstone, June, 1904.