60 BULLETIN 142, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



high, and pitch on a bare patch of shingle ; this was shortly before midday, 

 and I thought it such an unusual circumstance that I skinned the bird for 

 my collection. 



Winter. — The woodcock is a winter resident as well as a migrant 

 in Great Britain. Dresser (1871) writes: 



Their numbers are, of course, greatly augmented in the winter, large num- 

 bers of immigrants being added to those which breed (as after mentioned) ; 

 indeed I am not sure whether all of those we have in winter are immigrants, 

 and that those which breed with us move further south in pursuance of their 

 migratory instinct ; but this is a point very difficult to discover. In the 

 district I now allude to, their numbers are much diminished on the appear- 

 ance of severe, frosty weather, when they appear to go to the coast, where 

 they find the feeding grounds more open ; if, however, the frost be slight, they 

 remain. 



On the west coast of Argyllshire they are found in greater numbers, and are 

 not so much confined to covers, being found in open weather scattered through 

 all the sheltered glens where there is any brushwood or even bracken. On 

 the occurrence of frost, however, they all gather to the low-lying covers near 

 the sea, where its influence serves to keep open the springs ; and in such weather 

 very large bags are often made, as they seem to come not only from the out- 

 lying spots above mentioned, but from the inland districts, where the frost 

 has sealed up every one of their usual haunts. 



DISTRIBUTION 



Breeding range. — Northern Europe and Asia. North in Scandi- 

 navia to latitude 67°, in Lapland and Finland, in western Kussia 

 to 65°, and in eastern Kussia to 64°. East to the Sea of Okhotsk. 

 West to the British Isles. South to the Azores, Canaries, and 

 Madeira (where it is resident), the Pyrenees, Alps, Transylvania, 

 Carpathians, Himalayas (up to 10,000 feet), Mongolia, and Japan. 



Winter range. — Great Britain, the Mediterranean basin, northern 

 Africa and southern Asia, Persia, India, Burma, China, Japan, and 

 occasionally Ceylon. 



Casual records. — Casual in the Faeroes, Spitsbergen, Greenland, 

 and North America. Prof. Wells W. Cooke (1912) says: 



It wanders occasionally to eastern North America, and has occurred in 

 Loudoun County, Va., in 1873 (Coues) ; Chester County, Pa., the end of Novem- 

 ber, 1886 (Stone) ; one was taken near Shrewsbury, N. J., December 6, 1859 

 (Lawrence) ; one, September, 1889, somewhere in New Jersey (Warren) ; one, 

 probably of this species, near Newport, R. I. (Baird, Brewer, and Ridg- 

 way) ; one at Chambly, Quebec, November 11, 1882 ( Wintle) ; and one at St. 

 John, Newfoundland, January 9, 1862 (Sclater). 



Egg dates. — Great Britain: 29 records, March 9 to August 5; 15 

 records, April 18 to June 22. 



