The Oolo^ists' Record^ March i, 1921. 15 



Other birds I met with in this valley were Quail (abundant), 

 Scops and Little Owls, Baillon's Crake, Great Grey and Red- 

 backed Shrikes, Goldfinch and many otheis. 

 Little Bustard, Otis tetrax, Linn. 



When one is pinched for time and in a strange country it is 

 something of a handicap and had I had the time I feel sure I could 

 have found a nest of this magnificent bird. 1 had my birds cornered 

 to a certain stretch of lucerne (alfalfa) and the beautiful male bird 

 was under observation on several occasions. One morning I found 

 three female birds ringing round the place where I thought the 

 nest was. At night I have heard the male in the same place calling 

 with a double metallic note the like of which I have never heard 

 before. I think that had I had more time I should probably have 

 found the birds common, for my observations did not extend to more 

 than a mile of ground. 



OOLOGICAL NOTES ON SOME OF THE BREEDING 

 BIRDS OF PALESTINE. 



By Capt. C. R. S. Pitman, LA., M.B.O.U. 



From an ornithological point of view Palestine is a most interest- 

 ing country and even more so oologically. First of all a brief des- 

 cription of the Holy Land is necessary, and it is extraordinary what 

 a diversity of country has been crowded into so small an area, which 

 is approximately 150 miles long with a breadth of 30 miles in the 

 north and 50 miles at the southern end. 



It is bounded on the west by the Mediterranean, and on the east 

 by the Jordan Valley depression, varying from 600 feet to nearly 

 1,500 feet below sea level, and containing Lake Huleh (the source 

 of the Jordan), the Sea of Gahlee, and the Dead Sea, the two former 

 fresh, and the latter extremely salt. 



In the North and South there are no particular physical features 

 which can act as lines of demarcation, and the boundary runs easterly 

 to Lake Huleh from the rockj^ Cape Ras el Nakura (about 10 miles 

 north of Acre) in the former instance; and from Rafa S.E. to Akaba 

 along the International Boundary of old Turkey and Egypt in the 

 latter ; but Palestine proper does not really extend farther south 

 than a line taken easterly through Rafa and Beersheba extended as 



