STARLING IN SCOTLAND, INCREASE AND DISTRIBUTION n 



Mr. Adam Skirving, of Croy's Property, near Dalbeattie, 

 says : " It was a new thing to see a Starling when I first 

 crossed the border. Now (1891) it swarms. About thirty 

 years ago (say I 860 or I 86 1) it began to make itself apparent, 

 and at that time the earliest nest was discovered. 



Again at Buccleuch, Parish of Castleton, Roxburgh, 

 Starlings were reported as only appearing " during the last 

 ten years" (i.e. back from the date of 1891 say 1881), "in 

 increased numbers," but they have been known in the district 

 for the last forty years say since 1861. 



FORTH. 



No information is contained in either the " Old " or " New 

 Statistical Accounts." 



In Haddington, as already seen under " Tweed," " no 

 great increase was evident, until recent years " (cf. Hardy). 

 But since, as we are informed by Dr. Crombie of North Ber- 

 wick, there has been a notable increase, their first appearance 

 dating " years ago." Dr. James Howden when he lived at 

 Musselburgh in 1847 as a l a d, kept a notebook, "which," 

 he writes us, " I still have, and I find headed ' The Fauna 

 of the Parish of Inveresk.' Amongst the birds, ' Sturnus 

 vulgaris^ which is then said to be ' frequent.' ' " About the 

 same time," he continues, " I used to spend my holidays 

 with Mr. A. Hepburn, then farmer at Whittinghame Mains, 

 East Lothian, a keen naturalist. He and the late Robert 

 Gray, then a bank clerk in Dunbar, and I used to shoot birds 

 and skin them ; and I distinctly remember thinking I had got 

 a prize when I shot a Starling, whose skin I have to this day." 



We can remember, within our own experience, the vast 

 difference in numbers of the Starling when a boy at Merchis- 

 ton Castle School, and when at home at Dunipace, Stirling- 

 shire. Of its vast increase since then we have so many 

 records and such a quantity of testimony that it is difficult 

 to select the most striking. A few must suffice as applicable 

 to Stirlingshire, referring to the carse-lands of Falkirk, up the 

 valley of the Carron and Bonny to the bases of the central 

 hills of the county, and as far west as the Blane valley and 

 the upper waters of the river Forth. 



