12 BRITISH BIRDS. 



compiled a list of Herefordshire birds for the Transactions of the 

 Woolhope Club, and this gentleman has been kind enough to 

 provide us with a hst of the locahties from which he had 

 received well-authenticated records of the bird, together with 

 information that has reached him since ; he adds that he 

 has no doubt that the bird is gradually extending its range 

 towards the west, and that, from the length of time it is stated 

 to remain, he has no doubt that it breeds in the county, but 

 that he had not been able to hear of a nest actually having been 

 found. Mr. A. B. Farn, of Breinton, near Hereford, however, 

 tells us that a pair reared their young at Norton Common in 

 1908. 



Taking Mr. Hutchinson's surmise as approximately correct, 

 it is clear from the records that the distribution of the 

 Nightingale in Herefordshire follows very closely the river- 

 valleys. It is found in its largest numbers (Mr. Cambridge 

 Phillips says in fair numbers yearly, and sometimes numer- 

 ously) in the valley of the Wye as far north as a few miles 

 south of Hereford. About Hereford it occurs less regularly, and 

 its visits become less frequent and its occurrence more sporadic 

 as the river is followed westwards, until about Hay, on the 

 Breconshire border, Mr. Cambridge Phillips describes it as 

 distinctly rare. 



In the south-west Nightingales have occurred at several 

 localities near the junction of the vaUeys of the Monnow and 

 Dove, close to the Monmouthshire border, but their visits 

 seem to be irregular, and probably represent the outposts of 

 the bird's distribution along the valley of the former river, 

 from its junction with the Wye at Monmouth. 



From the north of Herefordshire there are several records 

 from the valleys o£ Lugg and the Frome, which point to a 

 gradual extension of range up these rivers. There do not 

 seem to be any authentic records from as far north as Leo- 

 minster, and from the Arrow and other rivers that here feed 

 the Lugg from the west, there is definite information that the 

 Nightingale has not yet been found along them. The localities 

 in the east of the county from which it has been reported, 

 besides those in the Frome valley, lie in the valleys of the 

 Leadon and Teme, and suggest that the bird is spreading west 

 from Gloucestershire and Worcestershire along these rivers. 



There remains a single locality, Kimbolton in the north of 

 the county, which appears to be widely separated from any 

 other established centre in Herefordshire. Birds appear to 

 have occurred there for some years past, and it is stated that 

 numbers of people journeyed up there from Leominster to hear 



