nOTES 



OCCURRENCE OF THE FIELDFAEE IN AUGUST. 

 On August 14tli last Mi-. E. Offin hauded to me an example of 

 the Fieldfare (Turdus pilaris) which his brother shot the previous 

 moruing (13tli) in his garden at Hockley, Essex. After taking 

 its measurements and weight, I at once skinned it. It was a large 

 male in partial moult, with aii expanse of 17| inches, length 

 lOf inches, wing 6 inches, and Aveight 3^ ounces. Its gizzard 

 contained the skins of six gooseberries and remains of skins of 

 others, together with the pips and pulp. I found no insect 

 remains or any other substance in it. The only tawny colouring 

 on the .undersurface is a pectoral band, the thi'oat and foreneck 

 being milky-white. y. W. Frohawk. 



THE NUTHATCH AS A NEST-BUILDER. 



A FEW observations I have been able to make on a nest of this 

 species built in one of my nest-boxes may be of interest. The 

 box in question is of the ordinary sort, that is, a hollowed pine 

 trunk resting on a board, by which it is affixed to the tree. On 

 April 14th last this Avas appropriated by a pair of Nuthatches. 

 The nest was completed in four days. Now that the young 

 ones have flown I am able to inspect the result of their labours. 

 Not content with plastering up the entrance and the wall 

 above it, they filled up the bottom of the box with mud, making 

 a cup-shaped hollow, and even went so far as to plaster up a 

 crack in one of the walls and the intei'stices on the outside 

 where the trunk is fastened on to its support. They must have 

 used fully three pounds of mud. On top of the saucer-shaped 

 hollow a great quantity of silver birch bark was piled up. Of 

 this I counted no less than one thousand eight hundred and 

 twenty pieces. The nearest birch tree is two hundred and fifty 

 yards away in a "bee-line" from the nest. Granted that only 

 one piece was carried at a time, this would make a total journey 

 of four hundred and fifty-five thousand yards, or two hundred 

 and sixty miles. The nest, as I have stated before, was com- 

 pleted in four days ; this would make an average journey of 

 sixty-five miles a day. Taking into consideration the amount 

 of labour required to collect and plaster that amount of mud in 

 the same time, I think it must be granted that the Nuthatches 

 were not idle. The remarkably clean state of the nest also 

 surprised me ; not a single sheet of this fine bark is soiled, nor 

 is the entrance besmeared in the least. Philip H Bahr 



Oxted. 



