56i 

 STONE CURLEW. 



CEdicnemus scolopax {Gmeliti). 



Summer visitant, chiefly to the East and North Ridings ; very 

 local, and decreasing in numbers ; still breeds in a few secluded districts. 

 A rare straggler to west Yorkshire. Has been observed in winter on 

 several occasions. 



An early allusion, probably the earliest, to the Stone 

 Curlew, is found in the MS. of Marmaduke Tunstall, F.R.S., 

 who lived at Wycliffe-on-Tees, thus : — 



" The Thick-kneed Bustard, or Stone Curlew. Very rare 

 in these parts, yet one was taken in this neighbourhood 

 in August 1782, probably blown out of its customary haunts 

 by storms, many of which felt about that time. It was 

 extremely lean and pined." (Tunst. MS. 1784, p. 83.) 



Thomas Allis, in 1844, wrote : — 



QLdicnemus crepitans. — The Great Plover — Breeds at Rossingtoa 

 and other places near Doncaster ; very rare near Leeds ; it also breeds 

 in the vicinity of Scarborough, see Yarrell's " British Birds." A. 

 Strickland says : " This bird used regularly to breed on the Wolds, 

 but never abundantly since my knowledge, and I have known both the 

 egg and young bird found, but they are now seldom met with ; they 

 are very clamorous in the evening." 



The Stone Curlew, Norfolk Plover, or Thick-knee, as it 

 is variously called, is a summer visitor, usually arriving in 

 April ; an exceptionally early date is March 1897, when 

 Mr. E. B. Emerson and his gamekeeper saw a pair on the 

 moor at Swainby-in-Cleveland. It is of very local distribution, 

 being almost restricted to the eastern half of the county, 

 and is, unfortunately, not only hmited, but decreasing, in 

 numbers. It was formerly not uncommon on the Wolds 

 and the rough unenclosed tracts of heath and warren, where 

 it bred in several districts until the middle of the past century. 

 Marmaduke Tunstall referred to it in north Yorkshire at the 

 close of the eighteenth century ; Allis and Strickland mentioned 

 it as breeding near Doncaster, and regularly on the Wolds 



