196 Kestrel 



It is possible that heredity would have some influence here, and 

 that those Kestrels reared on a diet of game-chicks in their nursery 

 days, would be the more ready, when they themselves took on family 

 cares, to fall back on this same hand\' and inexhaustible source of 

 supply. 



This sounds a very harsh indictment against the Kestrel, but 

 I am trying to put the case fairly and without prejudice. Kestrels, 

 I believe, do no harm whatever to game, except under artificial 

 conditions ; that is to say, where game is hand-reared in large 

 quantities. Even there, on these highly-preserved estates, I do 

 not suppose that one pair of Kestrels in three, perhaps not one in 

 five, do any damage whatever to game right through the breeding- 

 season. And these birds have a heavy balance on the credit side 

 for the good they do. 



But as regards the minority on the black list, whether this be 

 one in three or one in five, or even less, the only thing to do is to 

 exterminate them root and branch or give up game-rearing by hand. 

 It is not the question of an occasional chick being taken ; once a 

 Kestrel has started on the rearing-held, I don't think anything short 

 of death stops him. He lifts chicks all day long ; it is almost 

 incredible the number of birds one pair of Hawks will take, day by 

 day. I remember losing thirty Partridge chicks at Sizewell in less 

 than ten days (we only had sixty altogether) at the hands of one pair 

 of Kestrels. That's nothing out of the way. Keepers often lost 

 a dozen Pheasants from one coop in the course of a morning. 



It must be understood that I am weighting the scales very 

 heavily against the Kestrel by selecting birds obtained between 

 May and July from highly-preserved grounds. Otherwise, I have 

 tried to hold the balance even, and simply to record the contents 

 of crop and stomach as we found them. I have not doctored my 

 series in any way. The skins were collected over a period of twenty 

 years or more, but the greater number in the last seven or eight years. 

 All the birds sent in were preserved, whether they were game-eaters 

 or not. By picking over a number of birds, keeping some and 

 destroying others, it would be possible to prove anything ; that 

 Kestrels were harmless to game or that they never ate anything but 

 game, according as our sympathies were anti or pro. I have kept 

 full dissection-notes of all the birds which came into my hands, 

 and have left the results to speak for themselves ; but inasmuch 

 as all my skins come from highly-preserved districts, I make out a 

 much worse case against the bird than if I had collected specimens 

 over the country generally. 



For the eight weeks, May 15th to July 15th, fifty-nine skins, 

 young or old, were examined, and twenty-five of these, that is 

 forty-two per cent., were feeding on or capturing game. 



Newton, in his " Dictionary of Birds," under Kestrel writes : * 

 " Where what are called ' tame ' Pheasants are bred, a Kestrel will 



* p. 47S, footnote. 



