By Colonel DRUMMOND HAY, C.M.Z.S. 

 ( Continued from page 24 1 . ) 



The Scottish Natural is t. 28jKi 1 n z**^ 



ON MIGEATION. i^fi' '^•^< 



iLUlLI BRAR' 



MIGRATION in this country I will, for convenience s^-^^. ♦ n^ 

 treat under four heads — namely, true or regular ; local 

 or partial ; accessory ; and lastly, occasional or accidental^ or, as 

 it has been termed, pseudo-migration. The term " true mi- 

 grant," in the strict acceptation of the word, according to Mr 

 Gould, cannot be applied to a bird in the country in which it 

 was bred, for that is its true habitat ; but in the country to 

 which it resorts for food or climate, it is there a true migrant 

 Thus our Swallows and other summer birds, according to this, 

 are not truly migrants in this country, and the only ones that can 

 claim to be such are the Fieldfare, Redwing, and others, which 

 are impelled to visit us in winter solely to obtain food for their 

 existence. I shall, however, adopt the broader view of the word, 

 and take these two sections of summer and winter visitants under 

 the one head of regular migrants. About fifty species of the 

 former visit these islands from the south every spring, while a 

 still larger number, if we include all our water-birds, visit our 

 milder and more equable climate each winter, instinctively 

 knowing that they will here find that food and shelter which the 

 more rigorous weather of the northern regions deny them. A 

 large proportion of our summer visitants confine themselves to 

 the southern and midland counties, through which they are 

 pretty generally diffused, but do not go much farther north than 

 in a line with York, with the exception of a few which may occa- 

 sionally straggle into Scotland, though reaching a far higher 

 latitude on the Continent of Europe, as I have previously shown. 

 Others, again, from what cause it is difficult to say, are very par- 

 tial and even capricious in their visits : thus the Nightingale 

 restricts itself almost entirely to the southern, eastern, and cen- 

 tral counties, never favouring Cornwall with its presence, and 

 rarely even Devonshire or Wales, while northwards it seldom 

 goes beyond Yorkshire or Durham. 



Ray's Yellow Wagtail {Budytes Rayi) may also be cited as 

 exceedingly partial in its visits. " We who reside in England 

 should be extremely proud of the beautiful Yellow-field Wagtail, 

 for ours is the only country in which it passes the summer. Why 



