52 TRANSACTIONS, NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF GLASGOW. 



in the nesting season, and to listen to its still mysterious 

 drumming as it rises high over the bogs and mosses. A great 

 and most noticeable augmentation of its numbers occurs each 

 year in mid-October. 



Jack Snipe (Gallinngo gallinula). 



An interesting species, varying much in the numbers present 

 from winter to winter. It is always conspicuous in suitable 

 localities soon after its arrival in early October. Successive 

 arrivals come in during the winter, these depending apparently 

 upon the weather elsewhere, as it is a bird that seems peculiarly 

 sensitive to meteorological changes. 



Dunlin (Tringa alpina). 



Extremely abundant on our great stretches of sand and mud 

 and shingle. Moving upwards or downwards with the flow or 

 ebb of the tide, the big flocks of these birds always form an 

 attractive sight to the ornithologist even when his interest may 

 be languid and listless. 



By the first week of May many pairs are upon the long salt 

 merses west of Southerness Point, and most charming it is to 

 watch their courtship. The thrilling notes of the male come 

 very near to being a veritable love song. The birds that breed 

 at Southerness are of the small race, whereas those found 

 breeding away inland round the lochs of the hill district are 

 larger and brighter, and are quite a month later in going to 

 nest. The species is most variable in measurements, and the 

 seasonal and age changes in the plumage are very striking and 

 not easily followed. Altogether the Dunlin is an interesting 

 study, whether we see it at its breeding stations on the merse- 

 land pools or around the moorland tarns in the wilder and 

 lonelier lands around the three Cairnsmores, or see it rush along 

 the shore on stormy winter days, now showing their dark upper 

 wings to the observer or turning up their silvery white under- 

 parts as they glide past, or hear it on dark spring nights piping 

 plaintively as parties of them migrate on their northward 

 flight. 



