i82 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



Behaviour of Birds under Abnormal Conditions. Now 



that the War is happily over, we feel we may place on record what 

 we noticed of the behaviour of birds here, during the Zeppelin raid 

 on Edinburgh on the 3rd of April 191 6. Even at this distance 

 (23 miles) the noise of the guns and bombs was very great, and the 

 concussions caused the windows and doors to shake and rattle. 

 Great disturbance was evident among the birds during this bom- 

 bardment ; the Tawny Owls, which had been perfectly silent, began 

 to hoot loudly. Partridges were to be heard calling in the iields all 

 round. Pheasants uttered their characteristic crow, while the Gulls 

 on the shore kept up an incessant clamour. As the bombardment 

 died down, so did these noises in the night, the birds apparently 

 resuming their interrupted slumber as soon as sufficient quiet 

 reigned. Mr Evans has kindly informed us that at Comiston, 

 immediately to the south of Edinburgh, the Rooks rose from their 

 nests in a body, cawing vociferously, and the Pheasants in the 

 neighbouring woods " crowed " all through the raid. We might, 

 perhaps, also mention the fact that all through the War, whenever 

 there was gunfire in the neighbourhood, the Pheasants crowed loudly ; 

 this has, of course, often been recorded, but it interested us to notice 

 that they never got accustomed to the gunfire, but called as loudly 

 at the end of the four and a quarter years as they did at the 

 beginning. Another thing we have noticed during the last four 

 years is, how much more frequently the Tawny Owls hooted in the 

 daytime than they did before. Here, the hooting of an Owl in the 

 daytime is believed to be a forerunner of disaster, but we wonder 

 whether distant detonations, perceptible to the wonderful ears of 

 the Owls, though too far off to reach our duller senses, might be the 

 cause. Loud gunfire did not invariably make the Owls call as was 

 the case with the Pheasants, but since the end of the War we have 

 but rarely heard Owls hoot in the daytime. Dr Charles Davidson 

 {Nature, ist February 191 7, p. 439) says that Pheasants showed 

 great signs of unrest over wide areas, both during the Jutland Battle 

 and during an explosion in a munition factory. AVe were very 

 much interested in his remarks on the subject in view of what we 

 ourselves had observed, but could not publish our notes because 

 the exact locality of the raid had not then been stated officially. 

 It is not only unusual sounds which cause birds to call in this 

 way ; for instance, an eclipse of the sun may have this effect. 

 During the partial eclipse on 21st August 1914, we heard Curlew 

 calling loudly and continuously, this ceasing Avhen the shadow 

 passed. Evelyn V. Baxter and Leonora Jeffrey Rintoul, 

 Largo, Fife. 



