100 BULLETIN 17 0, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



of Greenland (1898), omits it from his list; and from a note on page 32, 

 I infer that it was merely a sight record at some distance from the 

 coast. Schi0ler also ignores the record altogether and states that there 

 are no occurrences for Greenland. The Massachusetts record, how- 

 ever, is sufficient to give this species a claim to figure on the American 

 list. The Greenland record, if quoted, should be relegated to brackets. 



HABITS 



There is one habit of this pretty little hawk that renders its identifi- 

 cation in the field a very easy matter, and that is its method of hunting. 

 One rarely watches a kestrel for more than a minute or two without 

 seeing it "heave to" with head to wind and remain stationary in the 

 air, sometimes with rapidly quivering wing tips and tail fanned out, 

 at other times almost motionless for a few seconds while its keen eye 

 scans the ground below. Then perhaps it drops a few feet through 

 space and renews its quest, or else moves off a little farther and repeats 

 the maneuver. This habit, together with its general brown coloration, 

 is enough to identify it with certainty in the British Isles. In the 

 Mediterranean region another species of kestrel with very similar 

 habits, but with brighter coloring and more sociable habits, might be 

 mistaken for it, and the red-footed falcon (Falco vespertinus) has the 

 same hovering habit, but both species are known in England only as 

 rare stragglers, while the kestrel is mainly resident and widely dis- 

 tributed over the whole of the British Isles and the adjacent islands. 

 There is a certain amount of migratory movement in the northern 

 part, for, in the Shetland Isles, they disappear entirely during winter. 

 This is probably due more to the absence of mice and insects than to 

 the cold, though in the northern part of the European Continent the 

 winter snows drive it south, as then it can subsist only on small birds. 

 In the Orkneys there are more gardens and enclosed spaces, so that 

 it can pick up a living, but in the northern parts of Scotland and 

 Ireland there is a very decided southward movement, and one meets 

 with birds evidently on passage in autumn traveling southward along 

 the river valleys, in places where they are not usually to be seen. 



The kestrel would be an exceedingly common bird in England were 

 it not for the gamekeeper. As a matter of fact, it is not as a rule 

 injurious to game. The great majority of kestrels never touch game 

 at all, but, in districts where pheasants are reared under hens in coops 

 in the open fields, a kestrel will occasionally come foraging for mice 

 and, seeing the young pheasants in numbers with apparently no 

 mother bird in charge, may pick up a chick and in certain cases will 

 return again and again for such easy prey, unless shot. 



As a rule no keeper troubles to ascertain whether a kestrel's inten- 

 tions are honorable or the reverse. By law they are in many counties 

 under protection, but no keeper ever troubles himself about such a 



