1()4 Pictures of Bird Life 



pr()\ ed by the fact that nearly all the birds that accidentally 

 wander to the l^ritish Islands, from more or less remote 

 countries, are birds of the year," 



This would seem at first si^ht to account for the frequent 

 arrivals, on the east coast especially, of birds which do not 

 visit us habitually, occasionally even of those Avhich lune 

 never before been met with in any part of Europe. 



For instance, the Asiatic species L/tsciuio/a .scZ/icarrJ (Kadde's 

 Bush-warbler), a young- bird, was recorded in KiKn^Icd^c as 

 shot in I.incohishire on February 1st, 1899. There is no 

 other record of this bird in Europe. 



A specimen of the Siberian Meadow-lnmtino- {E)iil)cri:,(i 

 cioidcs) was shot at Flamborough in Xo\"ember, 189G, and has 

 also ne^er been obtained in any part of Europe before, not 

 even in Heligoland. 



It would be interesting, if such a thing were possible, to 

 find out what cause led these wanderers from the north of 

 Asia to visit this country. P^or the true home of the latter 

 species seems to be in " Turkestan, Siberia, Mongolia, Man- 

 churia, and Korea, and over a great part of China *" (Saunders). 



Three specimens of the Desert- wheatear {Sd.ricold dcscrti), 

 a native of Xorth African deserts, have been obtained in 

 England. One of tliese is described as a young bird (Saunders). 

 But if other competent observers are correct, Dixon is wrong, 

 both in his facts and in his deductions from them. For the 

 late Herr Gatke, who studied the migratory movements of 

 birds for fifty years at Heligoland, that wonderful natural 

 observatory of bird life, altogether denies that the majority 



