258 THE MIGRATION OF BIRDS. 



when little or no Flight has been remarked over the 

 famous island. The same remarks apply to our 

 own islands ; great waves and rushes being witnessed 

 on the western or northern coast-lines, and scarcely 

 any to correspond with them on the eastern, which 

 clearly seems to demonstrate how wide and vast are 

 these feathery tides, only breaking here and there 

 on the coast, owing to local influences. The width 

 of some of these vast east to west Bird Waves is 

 enormous ; they have been known to break almost 

 simultaneously on our shores from the Faroes or 

 the Shetlands and the Orkneys in the north to the 

 Channel Islands in the south, a distance of some 

 900 miles ; how much further they may have 

 extended north and south remains a mystery ! 

 Gatke, writing on these Avian Waves, on October 

 6th, 1883, with a N.E. wind and clear fresh weather, 

 remarks : " Across the sea both sides of island (N. 

 and S.), particularly on north side, countless 

 numbers of comix [Hooded Crows], sturnus 

 [Starhngs], and all kinds of small birds, all from 

 E. to W. This occurrence happens not rarely ; 

 during this ponderous migration there were on the 

 island nearly no birds." Some of these Bird Waves 

 are very persistent, for days and even weeks 

 together, but normally the East to West autumn 

 migration breaks principally upon our shores in 

 two great floods, the first during the second and 

 third weeks in October, and the second about a 

 month later. The migration of each particular 

 species in this great Avian wave varies considerably 



