EUROPEAN WHEATEAR 295 



mined plant fiber, 3%. The animal matter consisted of one jumping 

 spider (Attidpr), 1%; fragment of another spider, trace; and fragment 

 of an undeterminable insect, trace. Gravel constituted 5% of the 

 total content." It may be noted that Bean (1S83) found wheatears 

 at Cape Lisburne in August feeding on grass seeds and fruits of 

 Saxifraga. The indigestible portions of the food, mostly the chitinous 

 parts of insects, are disgorged as pellets, a habit probably found in all 

 insectivorous passerines, though in many it has not been recorded. 



Behavior. — The wheatear is a lively and sprightly bird, constantly 

 active. As already mentioned, it is a characteristic species of open 

 country, with a liking for rather stony and waste places. In describ- 

 ing its behavior it will be convenient to follow, but slightly to expand, 

 the condensed and necessarily somewhat "telegraphic" account that 

 the Writer gave in the "Handbook of British Birds" (1938, vol. 2). 

 It is essentially terrestrial in habits, moving over the ground in a 

 quick succession of long hops, sometimes so rapidly that it seems to 

 run, frequently halting on some little eminence or flitting a short dis- 

 tance from one such perch to another, or making little fluttering 

 dashes into the air after insects. At rest the carriage is rather upright, 

 but it is seldom long still, constantly bowing and bobbing and at the 

 same time spreading the tail and moving it up and down. When 

 perching off the ground it usually does so on fences, walls, rocks, or 

 heaps of stones, sometimes on bushes, but in England not often on 

 trees. Where there are scattered trees on its breeding ground it 

 may sometimes be seen to perch on them, but it has been repeatedly 

 observed that on migration the Greenland wheatear is much more 

 disposed to perch in trees than birds of the present race. That an 

 Arctic race breeding on treeless barrens should show a greater liking 

 for trees than one accustomed to more temperate latitudes may seem 

 odd, but is none the less a fact. In the days when it was usual to 

 read human feelings and motives into the actions of animals it might 

 have been suggested that the disposition to perch on trees was suffi- 

 ciently explained by the very fact of a sojourn in lands where any such 

 inclination could not be indulged. Nowadays such explanations will 

 hardly satisfy. In actual fact there is evidence that the habit is a 

 peculiarity of northern-breeding wheatears whether they nest in tree- 

 less regions or not. In Lapland, where birds of the present race breed 

 regularly in more or less open and rocky places in forested country, 

 they perch freely on the tops of the tall pine trees, and it has recently 

 been recorded that among wheatears in at least some parts of Scotland 

 the habit is far more prevalent than is the case in England. The 

 behavior of the Alaskan birds where trees are available does not seem 

 to have been noted. The flight of the wheatear when sustained is 



