COMMON KINGFISHER. | 345 
are fed assiduously. Mr. Carter says that he has watched them carry fish 
to their young every quarter of an hour, and that he once found a loach 
34 inches long laid in the mouth of a hole containing young. When able 
to leave the nest they are fed and tended for some time by their parents. 
They take up their stations on the bushes or stumps near their birthplace, 
and there wait for the food which is being brought every few minutes by 
the old birds. When able to forage for themselves they are driven off by 
their parents, compelled to seek haunts for themselves, and it is possible 
that many of these young birds wander southwards in the autumn. 
In Western and Southern Europe the migrations of the Kingfisher are 
confined to short journeys in search of food. As soonas its fishing-grounds 
are frozen, it is compelled to leave them ; and thus it is obliged to descend 
from the mountains in search of open water in the valleys and plains. In 
Eastern Europe the severity of the winter compels it to migrate ; and some 
find their way to Egypt, whilst others join the great western stream of 
migration in autumn and reach our shores. They are occasionally men- 
tioned in the “ Migration Reports” of the lighthouse-keepers on the east 
coast of England; and Dixon writes as follows respecting their appearance 
on the Lincolnshire coast at that season :—“They arrive on this coast 
about the same time as the Woodcock, usually remaining in the district 
during the winter and disappearing again in spring—that is, those for- 
tunate individuals who have escaped the never-ceasing persecution of the 
gunners on the coast. Their favourite haunts are the open drains which 
divide the fields and the sluggish dykes behind the sea-banks. These 
localities seem strange haunts for such a species. I always associate a 
well-wooded stream with the home of this aerial gem; but here they have 
no cover, and are obliged to take up their quarters amongst the masonry 
or woodwork of the sluices and bridges which span the dykes. These dykes 
swarm with suitable food, and the bird would be well-suited were it not so 
incessantly shot at. I have often been obliged to stamp or knock heavily 
on one of these bridges before the bird would leave it, to glide like an arrow 
down the stream. Though they are so common here, they are not at all 
gregarious. LHach pair keeps to its favourite retreat; and though there 
may be several birds within half a mile or less, they never seem to intrude 
upon the domain of their neighbours. In such a locality the bird’s habits 
can be easily studied. There are no branches or bushes to hide the little 
fisherman from view ; and you may see him plunge again and again into 
the shallow waters in quest of his fish or insect food. I have watched him 
fishing most industriously from an old stump sticking out of a pool, on 
whose banks a Heron was standing, lost, as it were, in thought, and on 
whose unruffled surface Coots and Waterhens were plashing about right 
heartily. Probably some of the Kingfishers that haunt the coast in 
winter are only migrants from the interior, where the streams are often 
