GARDEN WARBLER. 73 



This species does not figure in the Migration Reports 

 on its spring passage, nor has it been noted in autumn so 

 often as the Blackcap. The only entries are : — 



1881, p. 20. At Spurn, 3rd September, and at Redcar on 

 22nd September, several were noted. 



1884, p. 44. At Spurn, 17th September, one struck the 



lantern and was killed, and several were seen 

 on the following day. 



1885, p. 42. At Spurn, 22nd August, one recorded. 

 The Garden Warbler's partiality for the fruit of the 



cherry is alluded to in Rennie's Field Naturalist (February 

 1833) as follows : — " I have never seen the Pettychaps in 

 Yorkshire until the cherries are ripe, when they immediately 

 make their appearance and attack the Kentish cherry 

 particularly, being so greedy that I have often taken them 

 with a fishing rod tipped with birdlime while they were 

 pulling at the fruit. The moment they have finished the 

 last Kentish cherries they disappear for the season. If 

 they finish the cherries in the morning they are gone before 

 noon .... in Yorkshire they do not even wait for the 

 later cherries. The number of these visitants depends upon 

 the crop of early cherries. This year the crop having nearly 

 failed, I saw but two of them, which appeared on the 15th 

 of July, and were not seen after the 17th." 



A departure from the usual choice of a nesting site has 

 been reported on several occasions, amongst the places selected 

 being the centre of a large fern ; a pear-tree ten feet above 

 the ground, at Beverley, in 1903 ; and in Bolton Woods a nest 

 was found on Whit Monday 1876, within four feet of a road. 



The vernacular names are : Small Straw in the West 

 Riding ; and Straw Small at Wilsden ; Nettle Creeper in 

 Craven; Peggy near Barnsley and in the West Riding ; Hair-tail 

 in the Nidd Valley. Great Pettychaps is given by Swainson ; 

 Willughby called it Pettychaps and Beccafigo, or Fig-eater. 



Pennant ("British Zoology," vol. ii. p. 264, ist Ed.) said 

 this is called in Yorkshire Beambird, but he was evidently 

 mistaken (cf. Montagu's " Ornithological Dictionary," p. 234, 

 and Yarrell's " Brit. Birds," 4th Ed., Vol. i. p. 415). 



