SHRIKES 33 



writing on the earliest available scientific name for 

 the "Woodchat (Ibis, 1883, p. 83), states that auricu- 

 Icttus, Mliller, adopted by Prof. Newton in his edition 

 of Yarrell, and by Dr. R. B. Sharpe in the Brit. Mus. 

 Catalogue of Birds, vol. viii. p. 283, is a Grey Shrike, 

 and probably Lanius minor; that rutilus, Latham, 

 though certainly applicable to the Woodchat, and so 

 employed in the former edition of this "Handbook," 

 is forestalled by 2^07neranus, Sparrman, which name 

 he considers should be selected for general use. 

 Brisson's name, rufus, however, is here adopted as 

 being the oldest for the species ; for although, as 

 Mr. Saunders states, it antedates the ornithological 

 era, 1766 (fixed by the date of the 12th edition 

 of Linnd's Systema Naturae), yet its revival in 1788 

 by Gmelin, who in that year edited the thirteenth 

 edition of that work, may be said to have restored it 

 to favour. 



It is a rare summer visitant to England. The 

 only record of its occurrence in Scotland is that 

 given in Don's " List of the Birds of Forfarshire," 

 and there is no instance known of its having been 

 found either in Ireland or in Wales. 



In an excellent paper entitled " The Status 

 of the W^oodchat in Great Britain" {Zool., 1892, 

 pp. 345-352), Mr. O. V. Aplin has shown that, even 

 including doubtful occurrences, not more than thirty- 

 five or forty examples have been killed in this 

 country, and those chiefly in the eastern and southern 

 counties. There is no doubt, however, that the 

 Woodchat has occasionally bred in England. The 



