The Oologists' Jiecord, March i, 1921. 23 



I would not call this species shy, as is sometimes stated, in 

 fact it is frequently rather Redbreast-like in its fearlessness and 

 confidence in man. Its song is beautiful and quite a joy to hear 

 throughout the early part of the summer, for it quietens down after 

 the latter part of June, but the truly pleasing feature of the bird life 

 in Palestine is the fact that there are plenty of birds, in actual 

 numbers and also a good many, species, which really do sing well, 

 a great contrast to such countries as Egypt, Mesopotamia and India. 

 Two broods are most certainly brought up in the season, perhaps 

 more, though I am inclined to doubt it, as late nesting birds have 

 probably lost previous eggs or broods for some reason or other, 

 though my experience was that the human factor in such cases was 

 a negligible quantity and it was only the War which brought in its 

 wake the ornithologist, and even then there were precious few of 

 them about. I have mislaid my notes about the departure of this 

 bird but the majority had left by the end of July, though I did see 

 an occasional straggler in the middle of August (one was noted at 

 Jericho, in the Jordan Valley, on 15th August, 1920) and even at 

 a later date in the coastal area. 



Before closing those lengthy notes on " Agrobates " I would 

 like to mention that I found a good many nests of A. familiaris 

 in Mesopotamia during the seasons 1916 and 1917, and the normal 

 clutch out there was five eggs. It would seem, therefore, that it 

 does not necessarily follow that a bird reduces the size of the clutch 

 it incubates because the climate is exceptionally hot, for that of 

 Palestine was nothing in comparison to the intense heat of Mesopo- 

 tamia. The size of the clutch I imagine, is much more likely to be 

 dependent on the question of food supply. 



Sylvia communis. 



1 have found the Common Whitethroat breeding both in the 

 Judean Hills and in the coastal plain. It is a summer visitor and 

 usually brings up a couple of broods in the plain, but I have not 

 enough data in this respect for the hills, as I only found one nest 

 there and that contained newly hatched young (2nd June, 1918). 

 In 1920 in the coastal plain, I found the low and somewhat open 

 scrub cover in the vicinit}- of the marshes a certain haunt, though 

 one or two nests were taken in the bushy foliage of low, pollarded 

 eucalyptus in groves, and one early nest was found in a small bush 

 amongst green crops on a vast diy plain. Nests were well concealed 



