204 The Field Naturalist's Quarterly August 



This device is constantly practised by the redshank. Let 

 me make a slight further digression in order to pay tribute 

 to the thoughtfulness of that most observant of marshmen, 

 Alfred Nudd of Hickling. Several years ago, long before I 

 had seen reference made to the fact in print, he mentioned 

 to me in other words the mimicry between the coloration 

 of coots' eggs and the dead leaves of the surrounding reed 

 stems stained by microscopic fungi. (Cf. Wallace on 

 Darwinism, and Zool., 1889, p. 547.) This reference to 

 mental impression reminds us of Jacob's successful experi- 

 ments upon Laban's cattle. 



There is a marked exception to the rule of white eggs 

 being generally well concealed in the Pigeon family : the 

 ring- and turtle-dove make rude open nests, and lay purely 

 white eggs. Several attempts have been made to explain 

 this oological crux. It has been suggested that both nest 

 and eggs are usually hidden from the view of overhead 

 marauders by the dense foliage of the trees in and amongst 

 which they are placed. The stock-dove, being an excep- 

 tionally early breeder, lays in holes in the ground, in 

 rabbit burrows, or under a furze-bush on the ground, or 

 in hollow trees. The ring-dove breeds somewhat later, 

 but its earliest nests — that is, those built before vegeta- 

 tion is well advanced — are never, so far as my experience 

 goes, placed in deciduous trees, but amongst the ivy 

 growing around them or in evergreens. A second ex- 

 planatory suggestion is that the platform shape of the 

 nest of wood-pigeon and turtle-dove admits of the light 

 passing through between the dark sticks of which these 

 nests are entirely composed, and that consequently the 

 white eggs lying on the dark sticks are rendered incon- 

 spicuous by the lights and shadows caused by these inter- 

 stices. As the young grow heavy these nests are solidified 

 and strengthened by the accumulating excreta of the nest- 

 lings, and so the supposedly protective light-holes are 

 closed up when the necessity for their presence has 

 passed away. A third and more probable explanation is 

 as follows :— these birds lay two eggs only, and begin to 

 sit directly after the first egg is deposited. Thus the 

 bird's own body hides the conspicuous coverings of its 



