230 THE BIRDS OF KENT 



Genus CALANDRELLA, Kaiip. 

 SHOET-TOED LAEK. 



Calandrella hracJiijdacfijIa (Leisler). 

 Ann. d. Weft. Ges. f. d. ges. Nat., iii., p. 357 (1814).. 



With regard to the Short-toed Lark in Kent, which 

 is, perhaps, one of the rarest accidental visitors, and the 

 subject of some httle doubt as to its occurrence in the 

 county, it is well to note that Mr. J. E. Harting 

 enumerates ten which, without hesitation, have been 

 taken in England, therefore it is highly probable that 

 the specimen referred to by Mr. Theo. Fisher in the 

 Zoologist (1885, p. 31) was a Kentish specimen. He 

 says : " Passing, by chance, a bird-catcher's shop, I 

 stepped in to ask the owner if he had ever caught any 

 rare birds. He told me that in June, 1883, he had caught, 

 near Orpington, in Kent, a peculiar Lark which no bird- 

 stuffer or bird-catcher of his acquaintance had been able 

 to name. The bird died, but he had it preserved, and 

 showed it to me, when I found it to be the Short-toed 

 Lark, Alauda hrachydactijla, Leisler. The bird-catcher 

 kept it for some time, and it soon became accustomed to 

 confinement, but, unfortunately, died soon after complet- 

 ing its moult. 'Its song,' he remarked, 'resembled that 

 of a Skylark, but was more varied." " 



The only other record is given by Mr. G. Dowker in 

 his Birds of East Kent, viz. : " I give this on the authority 

 of Mr. G. P. Saville, that a specimen was shot by Mr. 

 W. Fleet, at AVells Court, Blean, in 1886." 



