72 BRITAIN^S BIRDS AND THEIR NESTS. 



THE AVOCET 



(Recurvirostra avocetta). 



The Avocet is a long-legged Wader with black-and-white 

 plumage, and a markedly upturned, long, slender bill. Down 

 to about 1824 it bred as a summer visitor in the marshes of 

 the south-east of England, to which it is now but an uncommon 

 migrant, as to other parts of the British Isles. It is perhaps 

 not impossible that under the efficient protection now afforded 

 in Norfolk this species may in time re-establish itself, as 

 the Ruff has begun to do. Such conspicuously beautiful 

 birds, however, are naturally the mark of every shore-shooter 

 who sees them ; and we cannot protect them on their migra- 

 tions. 



THE OYSTER=CATCHER 



(Haematopus ostralegus). 



Plate 24. 



Rivalling and perhaps outdoing the Redshank in point of 

 noisiness is the rather large Wader, the Oyster-Catcher, a 

 well-known bird of the seashore and the shingly river-bank. 

 In summer the latter haunt is especially characteristic, and 

 no bird obtrudes itself more often on the notice of the 

 angler, standing thigh -deep in the waters of, say, a 

 Scottish salmon-river flowing past the great banks of 

 rounded stones so often accumulated on the convex curves 

 of the banks. Streams that flow strong and deep between 

 abrupt banks, or streams meandering through lowlands 

 cultivated to the water's edge, have no attraction for the 

 Oyster-Catcher ; but where the stretches of shingle are ample 

 enough for the bird's eggs and nestlings to lie on with little 



