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[[circle]] 190 [[/circle]]
[[underline]] Serranus [[/underline]], Dec. 14, 1955, II.
3.00pm. A whole new outlook!

Found an island in the lake where there is obviously a breeding colony well-established About 25-30 prs probably.

The island is small and rocky (not very large boulders, however).  The only obvious vegetation is a good deal of the short, tussock-y, grass which is so common around here.

     This island is about 1/4 of a mile from the nearest bit of mainland. I can see much of what is going on, and even hear some of the calls given by the birds, and some of the birds occasionally fly over to show much aerial hostility over my head; but it is somewhat difficult to determine the exact stage of the breeding cycle represented by the colony as a whole.  I haven't noticed any early pairing behavior.  Boundary disputes are occasionally conspicuous & prolonged.  There is little redirected aerial hostility.  I have seen quite a number of copulation attempts Some of the birds may be sitting on eggs; but some pairs obviously can't have nests ([[image - male symbol]] & [[image - female symbol]] sitting side by side on rocks in water).  My guess is that most of the birds are just at the immediate pre-egg stage

Now to get down to the behavior of the birds.

Lots of aerial hostility by the birds which come to fly over me.

I think that my analysis of the aerial call notes needs to be revised, or rather extended, somewhat.  The aerial LCN's are extremely varied, long and short, "pure" or "rasping" (i.e. with R or rattle undertone).  The longer & purer notes seem to be higher intensity than the shorter & more rasping notes.  (It must be mentioned, however, that there are occasionally short pure notes and long rasping ones; although there seems to be a definite correlation between length & pureness, ie. the notes tend to get purer higher & shriller, as they get longer).  The very high, shrill, pure notes are apparently produced by a preponderance of attack drive, as they are frequently given by the birds flying straight towards me. These