334 Mr. Joseph I. S. Whitaker on the 



Professor Robert Collett, of the Zoological Museum at 

 Christiania, in reply to my inquiry, has kindly written to me 

 on the point as follows : — 



" For several years there has not been a good cone-year for 

 the spruce-fir in Norway, and the Crossbills have been very 

 scarce with us for several years. This summer we observed 

 small flocks of L. curvirostra in the beginning of July, not 

 earlier. In the course of the month they totally dis- 

 appeared, and we have not seen them since. They tried to 

 eat the young green cones of the Larches in the gardens. 

 I did not observe them in the forest, but heard that some 

 were seen there, but the flocks have never been great with 

 us this year. I should think that the wandering swarms 

 came from the east." 



The tardy ripening, or even in some cases the absolute 

 lack, of the Crossbills' main sustenance was probably more 

 or less general last year, not only in Northern Europe, but 

 in the coniferous forests further east and south. Even from 

 Italy reports of the scarcity of fruit on the pine- and fir-trees 

 have been recorded. Prof. A. Bonomi, of Rovereto (Trent), 

 writes that in that district, owing to the tempestuous 

 weather experienced in the preceding spring, as he had him- 

 self ascertained by personal observation, the coniferous woods 

 were absolutely bare of fruit. Even so far south as Sicily 

 vegetation generally was in a most backward state last year, 

 owing to the severities of the previous winter and spring. 



On the whole, there appear to be good grounds for sup- 

 posing that the Crossbills' food-supply was deficient last 

 year throughout the whole of the species' true habitat ; and 

 until some better reason can be assigned for it, 1 think we 

 are justified in considering that fact to be the reason of the 

 birds wandering from their home. 



The theory of an unusually prolific breeding-season 

 having driven a considerable number of the birds to seek a 

 home elsewhere is hardly to be entertained, nor could it, I 

 may venture to think, suffice to account for the extra- 

 ordinary migration experienced last year. 



With regard to the country or countries from which the 



