Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1981, Blaðsíða 139

The Collection of Wild Birds’ Eggs and Nestlings in Sweden
147
box] is the bee-hive of the fishing Lapp, which in due time will
be robbed” (Laestadius, 1831, p. 215).
However, some selling of eggs also took place, at any rate of
water-birds’ eggs. Iwan Fischerstrom has observed that hawkers in
Stockholm in the 1860s sold the pickled eggs of the goldeneye
(Fischerstrom, 1967, p. 90). Such selling is also mentioned in 1824
in the Áboland archipelago in Finland (Walter af Pettersen, quoted
by C. A. Bergstrom, 1964, p. 94).
It was not only the eggs of the wild birds which were taken;
in certain cases, their nestlings also met with the same fate. Stora
has discussed in detail the method of extracting young guillemots
from the nest, using a special implement, a long stick with a hook
at the end (Stora, 1966). He states that this method was also used
in Sweden and quotes, inter alia, Ekstrom’s description of 1832 from
the Sodermanland archipelago. To this, I may add Broman’s infor-
mation of a much earlier date from the coast of Hálsingland. As
already indicated, Broman writes that the trappers used sticks with
hooks to extract the nestlings, “when they have hatched out; the
parent birds bring them small fish, which makes them very plump.
In former years, there were hundreds of guillemots at many places
here in the summer .... so that trappers could produce baskets
full of eggs and nestlings from under stones. But since the very cold
winter of 1700, there have been few or none at all.” (Broman 3, p.
302.) Another report dated 1833 comes from Oro, south of Váster-
vik, where two travellers reported that they “searched for guillemot
young and found some without feathers in a cleft in a rock. They
are collected here by means of hooks on long poles, which are
thrust into the narrow clefts. We had no other instrument than two
rammers, tied together with a scraper on the end.” (Wallman and
Moberg, 1833.) It is reported from the same place that the young,
particularly those of the common gull (Larus canus), were collected
and roasted, while all other birds were boiled. The young of the
great black-backed gull (Larus marinus) were also good, while those
of the black guillemot (Cepphus grylle) tasted of train oil. They
were appreciated, however, since they were so fat that one or two
could be placed in the pan, together with other birds, as a substitute