fC^TO^K 



{Authors are responsible for nomenclature used.) 







I 



The Scottish Naturalist 



No. 26.] 1914 [February 



EDITORIAL. 



The question is often asked, " Do our summer migrants 

 sing in their winter quarters ? " In this connection the 

 following remark by Mr L. Beresford Mouritz, in a paper 

 on " Birds Observed in Katanga, Belgian Congo," published 

 in The Ibis for January, is interesting. On 6th October 

 191 1 he saw "a number of Willow Wrens (Phylloscopus 

 trocJiilus), and heard them singing feebly ; they appeared 

 to have only just arrived" (p. 29). In the same journal 

 (p. 169) Mr George L. Bates states that in January 191 3, 

 in a grassy plain at Akonolinga, north of the forest region 

 at Bitye, German Camerun, he saw a good number of 

 European winter migrants. " Especially were Swallows 

 there in immense numbers, skimming by day over the river- 

 bottom plain, especially over parts of it where water was 

 still standing, and gathering in huge flocks to roost at night 

 in the tall grass of the higher ground. As mosquitoes were 

 very abundant, it seems a reasonable guess to suppose that 

 the Swallows were attracted by the numbers of mosquitoes 

 upon which to feed." As Mr Bates has obtained only 

 two specimens of Hirundo rustica during many years' 

 collecting at Bitye, it seems probable, he thinks, "that the 

 bulk of the southward winter migration stops in Africa 

 at the edge of the great forest." 



The chief item of interest in Scottish ornithology to be 



recorded this month is to be found in the visit of a number 



of Waxwings. This erratic " Bohemian " from the far north 



of the European continent has been in evidence in most 



26 D 



