20 JULY 1907, Page 18

NURSERIES OF SEA-FOWL..

[To THE EDITOR Or TIER " SPROTRTOR."1 Sin,—The writer of the article on the above subject in Uzi Spectator of June 29th refers to the fulmar-petrel as being "restricted to St. Kilda amongst our islands." This bird, however, is now to be found in Westray, the most north.: westerly of the Orkney Islands. This island, entirely exposed to the Atlantic on the west, presents, for some four cr five miles, precipitous and almost inaccessible cliffs, terminating in the north in Loup Head. A lighthouse was built here about 1898, and I was informed that the first pair of fulmar. petrelswere seen near it in the following year. In 1901 there were certainly three or four pairs. On one afternoon in 1903 I counted eleven of these birds, most of them in the immediate vicinity of the lighthouse, but one pair near Whey Geo, some four and a half miles to the south of Loup Head. I am glad to be able to inform you that they are in no way molested by the islanders, who at one period were in the habit of slaughtering sea-fowl by thousands.—I am, Sir, &c.,