Wheat-ear 267 



THE WHEAT EAR (SAXICULA 



AENANTHE). 



THIS bird is known by several names, thus — 

 Fallowsmith, White-tail, White-rump. 

 This clean, and to the ornithologist, interesting 

 bird, is one of our earliest summer visitants, sometimes 

 appearing even when the ground is whitened with the 

 last snow showers of spring. It is a common species, 

 and extends from the Land's End to Cape Wrath, reach- 

 ing northwards to the Hebrides. It abounds in the 

 downs and warrens of the south, on the lower ranges of 

 sea-coast around our islands, and in nearly all the pastoral 

 districts of Scotland. In the latter it arrives in the first 

 week in March, and spends the breeding season, flitting 

 from stone to stone, from one rising ground to another, 

 or in a district where stone walls form the enclosures, 

 flitting before the traveller, and appearing to fall, as it 

 were, on the opposite side of the wall, when starting to 

 resume its flight It breeds in holes, under and among 

 rocks and stones, in the burrows of rabbits, even occasion- 

 ally in those scraped by the Sand-Martin, in old walls 

 and in quarries, and the nest has been found in the rents 

 or splits of dry peat mosses. The nest is built according 

 to the form of the hole, and is composed of fine grasses, 

 with a little lining of wood or hair. The eggs are of a pale 

 green. The food, during its residence in Britain, is 

 composed of insects. On the coast the small mollusca 

 of the warrens are its composite food. 



The colours of the adult birds blend and harmonize 

 beautifully together, and are at the same time very con- 

 trasted. The forehead, and a stripe above the eyes, 

 are white ; the space between the bill and the eyes, the 

 auriculars, the wings, one third of the outer tail feathers, 

 and the whole of the pair in the centre are deep black ; 

 the secondaries, quills and coverts, being edged with a 

 pale brown, or brownish-white. These decided markings 

 relieve the pale and delicate bluish-grey of the head and 



