DUBLIN WA.TURAL HI8T0BT 80CIETT. 149 



could be caught by the dozen in the morning. Lapwing suffered more 

 than the other plover. All the crows escaped the general destruction in 

 a groat measure, and were usually in good condition, as they feasted 

 sumptuously on the dead and dying small birds. Curlew and duck ma- 

 naged to live very well, as their feeding-places between high and low 

 water-mark were never frozen, but many seem to have been killed by 

 the frost at night in their roosting-places. 



"Woodcocks, strange to say, did not seem to suffer by the cold, though 

 thousands perished by the hand of man. They were very numerous, 

 and in first-rate condition, but were easily shot and destroyed, coming 

 into places where a " cock," in the recollection of the oldest inhabitant, 

 had never before been seen. In the town of Cahirciveen a boy used to 

 kill three or four of them every day. He lived in the house next to the 

 hotel; in his garden there was a stream; into this he used to put a freshly 

 cut furze-bush ; under this the cock used to pitch, which he generally 

 managed to knock down with a stick. I may also mention that hares 

 perished in great numbers by the cold and the natives. 



The following year (1856) game of every kind, especially snipe, 

 were extremely scarce (of the latter scarcely any, except the gray or 

 home-bred birds, being to be seen) ; also all kinds of small birds, black- 

 birds, thrushes ; migratory thrushes were scarcely to be seen at alL 

 The gulls and curlews (of the sea birds) seemed to be nearly as plentiful 

 as in former years. The only cock that I met with that year were the 

 small variety, or "Yankees," and they did not appear in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Cahirciveen till February. Even this year (1859) the 

 game have not recovered the destruction of that year, every sportsman 

 complaining of the scarcity; though in the county of Clare I have re- 

 marked more cock (the large variety) than I have seen since the year of 

 the frost. 



Mr. Robert J. Montgomery stated that from observations made by 

 him that year in the county of Louth, he could fully bear out the fact 

 of the extraordinary destruction which had occurred among birds. 

 Many species had not recovered from it yet. All the species recorded 

 in Mr. Kinahan's list had also been found dead in Louth. The most 

 abundant were redwings, fieldfares, skylarks, golden plover, and green 

 plover. Wild swans, owing to the severity of the season, were more 

 numerous that year than he ever recollected them. The various species 

 of Anatidffi, &c., were also very numerous, as several species were found 

 on the Boyne which he had never met there previously. He had that 

 winter shot there no less than seventeen species, a very large proportion 

 for so restricted a locality. The following was the list : — mallard, 

 gadwaU, pintail, shoveller, widgeon, teal, tufted duck, golden eye, 

 pochard, scaup, shield-duck, common scoter, velvet scoter, goosander, 

 merganser, smew, and the long-tailed duck. 



Mr. Robert Warren stated that on the north-west coast at Killala 

 the destruction had been very great among jujuatic birds. The com- 

 mon curlew was the commonest found dead. He remarked also that 

 the mallard suffered much more than the widgeon or other ducks. 



