NIGHTS ON THE WATER 



Night hours in woods or stackyards discover much life that 

 is obscure in the daylight ; but it is by mere and river that 

 the evening and night are most prolific of strange sights and 

 sounds. It is a common practice of Norfolk naturalists to 

 spend nights on the broads ; and there are few experiences 

 more full. Soon after sunset the great noctule bats, looking 

 strangely large to those only accustomed to the commoner 

 pipistrelle, are usually to be seen in the early days of May. 

 They come out to feed and flitter in the twilight, screech 

 shrilly, as they wage war on the night-flying beetle, often 

 dropping sharply with half-folded wing. When some great 

 coleopterous creature has been caught, you can distinctly 

 hear the scrunch of its shelly covering as the animal's long 

 sharp teeth break into it. By blowing into a small key you 

 may produce a whistle sharp enough to bring a response 

 from the bat, which may flutter so close to your head that 

 the puff of a wing-beat may be felt as it passes. 



The redshanks nesting on the marshes have ended their 

 piping. In the day they broke the silent task of incubation 

 by a foray after ditch prawns and other ' shrimps ' and crea- 

 tures on the muddy margins of the river : or if the tide was 

 high, by a hunt along the ditchsides where the little shrimps 

 and side-swimming gammarus swarm, and where a host of 

 species of water-beetles circle and dance. 



