164 STlllGlD/E. 



score. It lies close, but when disturbed will often mount 

 high and seem to suffer no inconvenience from the daylight. 

 Many of those that visit Great Britain in the autumn pass 

 on, while others abide through the winter and retire north- 

 ward again in the following spring. A few, however, breed 

 in this country from Cambridgeshire northward. Although 

 the fact seems to have been only published in 1833, when 

 Hoy first announced it in the ' Magazine of Natural History,' 

 it is certain that before the draining of the fen-country in 

 the east of England, the Short-eared Owl bred as regularly 

 and as commonly in that district as did any of the Harriers. 

 Now there are left but few sedgy tracts suited to it, though 

 nests may occasionally still be found on the upland heaths. 

 The mistaken zeal of gamekeepers, however, in destroying 

 this and other species of Owls, which are probably the very 

 best friends the preserver of game could possess, precludes 

 the chance of such nests remaining unmolested unless placed 

 in the most unfrequented spots. Some eggs taken at Little- 

 port, in the Isle of Ely, in 1864, are the latest in this part 

 of England, which have come to the Editor's knowledge ; 

 but in August, 1854, he saw on a dry heath at Elveden, in 

 Suffolk, two young birds, nearly full grown but unable to 

 fly ; and in the same year at least two nests were taken in 

 the fens of the south-west of Norfolk. 



Mr. Rocke (Zool. p. 9687) believes that this species breeds 

 in Shropshire, and from Yorkshire northward to the Orkneys, 

 there is little doubt that it does so with more or less regularity. 

 Sir William Jardine describes two nests found by him in 

 Dumfriesshire, some forty years ago, with five eggs in each, 

 as being "formed upon the ground among the heath; the 

 bottom of the nest scraped until the fresh earth appeared, on 

 which the eggs were placed, without any lining or other 

 accessary covering. AVhen approaching the nest or j^oung, 

 the old birds fly and hover round uttering a shrill cry, and 

 snapping with their bills. They will then alight a short 

 distance, survey the aggressor, and again resume their flight 

 and cries. The young are barely able to fly by the 12th of 

 August, and appear to leave the nest some time before they 



