62 The Whitethroat. 



Family— TURDID.F.. Subfatnily—SYL VIINAl. 



The Whitethroat. 



Sylvia cinerca, BechsT. 



BREEDS abuudantly in Scandinavia and Western Rnssia as far north as 

 lat. 65°, and in the Ural Mountains up to lat. 60°, southwards throughout 

 Europe to the Mediterranean. It winters in the Canaries and Northern 

 Africa, passing through N.E. Africa on migration and extending its wanderings 

 down the west coast to Damaraland. Eastwards it occurs in Asia Minor, where 

 it is abundant in the nesting-season, in Palestine, where it is partly resident, in 

 Persia, Turkestan and South-west Siberia. 



In Great Britain it is very common and generall}- distributed, being most 

 rare in the extreme north of Scotland, and unrecorded from the Outer Hebrides. 



The adult male in breeding plumage has the head, neck and upper tail- 

 coverts smok}' grey, the remainder of the upper parts greyish brown, deepest on 

 wings and tail, the wing-coverts and innermost secondaries broadly margined witli 

 rufous ; the outer tail-feathers paler than the remainder, broadly bordered and 

 tipped with white. Under surface white, shaded on the breast with vinous-buff 

 and on the flanks with buff; under wing-coverts and axillaries smok}- gre}' ; bill 

 dark brown, the lower mandible paler, feet pale brown, iris hazel. The female 

 differs in the absence of the grey head and upper tail-coverts, and vinous breast. 

 After its autumn moult the male resembles tiie female. Young birds are more 

 rufous brown. 



The Whitethroat reaches us about the second week in April, though in mild 

 seasons I have met with it earlier ; it takes its departure early in September. It 

 is essentially a bird of the thicket, hedgerow, shrubbery or garden : in open spots 

 overrun with blackberry, honeysuckle, stunted hawthorn, long rank grass and 

 nettles 3'ou are almost certain to hear its cheerful little song or its harsh alarm 

 note. Though rarelj' met with in dense woods, it abounds in those narrow strips 

 of wood known in Kent by the names of sliaivs and s/iavea ; 3'et in lanes, and 

 little frequented country roads where the liedges arc untrimmed, and fringed at 

 the bottoms with nettles and goose-grass, the Whitethroat is most in evidence ; 

 here, among the nettle heads, the flimsy nest is often su.spended ; not that the 



