News

Memories of the Pomatorhine

.
After a return visit to observe the pale morph Pomarine Skua earlier in the week, I was inspired to investigate some of the historic observations of the species in Britain. I find it fascinating how things change over the centuries, not only species names, but also the way in which people have recorded and studied their occurrence on our shores.

Morris (1891) writes:

"One of the species was taken in Sussex in the village of Ovingdean, in October, 1844. It had struck down a White Gull, which it would not quit; it was kept alive above a fortnight, and then died. The very first day of its captivity it devoured twenty-five Sparrows. Once it escaped, and immediately attacked a Duck, which it held till re-captured.

Three were obtained in Scarborough, Yorkshire, by W.H.Rudston-Read, Esq., in October 1831. In the heavy storm of the same month, 1879, nearly five hundred were obtained, a most useless slaughter. Another great flight was noted with the deep snow-fall at the end of October, 1880.

In the year 1837 many were on sale in the London markets, and eight or ten of them had been caught alive. Two were captured in 1831 in Devonshire; others have been taken on the Suffolk coast. One was shot in Hackney Marshes, near London.

They advance southward in the autumn, and return towards spring. This bird, like its congeners, lives a life of rapine, and thrives on robbery, paying no regard to the principles of 'meum' and 'tuum', but, guided solely by self-interest, avails itself of the labours of others, and plunders them without scruple of their hardly-earned food, which it thus makes its own."

Morris, Rev. F. O. (1891) A History of British Birds - Volume six. 3rd ed. London: John C. Nimmo.