VOL. vii.] NOTES, 229 



PIED WAGTAILS REARING TWO BROODS 

 IN ONE NEST. 



On May 9th, 1913, I found a nest of the Pied Wagtail 

 {Motacilla a. luguhris), situated in a bridge spanning the 

 river Blythe, near Hampton-in-Arden, Warwickshire, a 

 situation in which a pair has bred for several years. On 

 this date it contained four newly-hatched young and an 

 addled egg ; these young had flown by May 25th, and 

 happening to look into the nest on July 27th I was surprised 

 to find a second brood of four well-feathered young. 



A. Geoffrey Leigh. 



rAs tliis habit appears to be rather uncommon in the 

 case of the Pied Wagtail, I may here record two instances 

 which have come under my observation. In June, 1911, 

 in some creepers growing over the porch of a house in 

 Burley, Hampshire, there was a Pied Wagtail's nest with 

 five eggs, one of which was that of a Cuckoo. When next 

 examined the nest contained only a young Cuckoo two or 

 three days old. The next day, June 22nd, the Cuckoo was 

 found to be dead, although the Wagtail was sitting on the 

 nest. The dead Cuckoo was removed. On July 15th the 

 bird was sitting on five of her own eggs in the same nest, 

 which so far as I could see had not even been relined, and 

 the young were eventually reared. 



In 1912 there w^as a Wagtail's nest within eight yards- 

 of the 1911 site, and probably the pair of birds were the 

 same. A brood of four was reared, and shortly after they 

 were fledged the nest was relined and the bird laid again. 

 A Cuckoo was searching about in the neighbourhood of the 

 nest on several days, and eventually a Cuckoo's egg w^as found 

 in it. On June 28th the young Cuckoo was alone in the 

 nest and in due course it fledged. 



Another case in which two broods were reared from the 

 same nest is recorded bv Mr. S. J. R. Dickson in Country 

 Life (19.VI1.1913).— H. F. Witherby.] 



CURIOUS BEHAVIOUR OF A YOUNG WHITETHROAT. 



On June 12th, 1913, while watching, at close quarters, a 

 young but fully-fledged Whitethroat {Sylvia c. communis), 

 one of the parent birds came out of the hedge close to me, 

 dropped to the ground almost at my feet and fluttered 

 slowly and wdth seeming helplessness away, presumably 

 feigning injury in an effort to distract attention from its 

 offspring. I continued to watch the young bird which \^'as 

 perched on a slender twig in a thick part of the hedge. In 

 Q 



