Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 February 1883 — A Novel Egg Fans. [ARTICLE]

A Novel Egg Fans.

The FaraUone ialanda are about thirty miles from the mouth of San Francisco bay, and they are the home of innumerable sea fowls. When San Francisco first began to be a city, its constant cry was for eggs. To supply the lack of eggs, the project of stealing those of the gulls and the muhrs of the FaraUone islands was undertaken, and it proved successful and has ever since been maintained. The birds are too plenty to count or to estimate, as may be inferred from the fact that the egg gatherers bring in often, or used to gather, 500 dozen a day, and a great many-of the nests are inaccessible, a great many others devastated by the rivalry of the birds themselves, and, of course, a large-part of the birds at any one time are not laying. The egg season is from May to" August, and, if even 400 dozen is the rule, the harvest would be pretty near 500,000 eggs. The quarreling between the. galls and the muhrs leads to the loss of a good many muhrs’ eggs, which the gulls at ©verychance destroy. The egg business is conducted by a company, which has the .right. It pays egg-gatherers 5 cents a dozen and sells them in San Francisco at a considerable advance.