i 9 4 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



locally the conditions in respect of geniality may have left 

 the fastidious something to desire, they were much worse in 

 England, and appeared in that country to become exaggerated 

 as the month progressed, culminating in the Easter snow- 

 storm the worst of which was experienced as late as 

 25th April of which the curious will find full particulars 

 in Symons's "Meteorological Magazine" (vol. xliii., No. 508, 

 May 1908). The natural corollary of this state of affairs 

 was the deficiency in the mean temperature over the whole 

 of the United Kingdom, " the deficit being greatest (three to 

 four degrees) over Eastern and Central England (I.e., p. 75)." 

 How these conditions were reflected on the ornithology of 

 England we have learned, partially at least, in Mr. W. Warde 

 Fowler's note in the "Zoologist," May 1908 (p. 177), Mr. 

 J. H. Gurney's "Ornithological Report for Norfolk (1908)" 

 in the same Journal in April 1909, and the Rev. A. Ellison's 

 ' Bird Life in a Spring Snowstorm ' (" British Birds," vol. ii., 

 1908-9, p. 301). Through this zone, where such untoward 

 conditions prevailed, our summer visitors could not penetrate, 

 and there is evidence that such disaster had overtaken some 

 of them, that they never reached the destinations in these 

 latitudes for which they had set out. A deficiency in the 

 numbers of the Swallow and House-Martin has been reported, 

 though this is, rather curiously perhaps, unsupported, but the 

 numbers of the Spotted Flycatcher were decidedly below 

 the average, while complete disaster seems to have over- 

 taken the Sedge- Warbler. Independent unsolicited testimony 

 from all quarters places this last fact beyond doubt. Why 

 this species should have suffered so signally we may never 

 know, but possibly its appearance in England may have 

 synchronised with the boreal outburst in the end of Easter 

 week. We learn from Mr. Gurney's report above quoted 

 that " the deficiency in Reed and Sedge Warblers was pointed 

 out to Mr. Bird on the Broads." 



For information regarding the paucity of summer visitors 

 in April in Scotland, the reader must refer to the notes 

 under Willow Wren, Swallow, etc., in the following pages, 

 and the narratives under Spotted Flycatcher, Sedge- Warbler, 

 etc., will be found to contain some curious matter regarding 

 what obtained later in the year. 



