238 PLATA-LEID.!. 



speaks of it in his time as an accidental visitor to Scotland ; 

 adding that he had received it from Orkney. Sir Thomas 

 Browne, who was contemporary with Merrett and Sibhald, 

 mentions "The Platea or Shovelard, which build upon the 

 tops of high trees. They formerly built in the Hernery at 

 Claxton and Rudham ; now at Trimley in Suffolk. They 

 come in March, and are shot by fowlers, not for their meat, 

 but their handsomeness ; remarkable in their white colour, 

 copped crown, and spoon, or spatule-like bill." Willughby 

 also describes a young Spoonbill taken out of the nest, 

 perhaps at Trimley. Mr. J. E. Harting has drawn attention 

 (Zool. 1877, p. 425) to an interesting record of the breeding 

 of the Spoonbill in Sussex. In a MS. survey of certain 

 manors taken in 1570, is a memorandum relating to various 

 parks, including Goodwood, and it is stated that " in the 

 woods called the Westwood and the Haslette, Shovelers 

 and Herons have lately breed [sic], and some Shovelers 

 breed there this year." It is clear that this relates to the 

 present species, and cannot possibly refer to the Shoveller 

 Duck. 



Pennant has recorded the visit of a flock of Spoonbills to 

 the marshes near Yarmouth in April 1774 ; and since that 

 date many have from time to time been observed — and, so 

 far as possible, killed — in Norfolk, Suffolk, and the eastern 

 counties of England : probably sixty or more. To the south 

 coast its visits have been less frequent, yet examples have 

 been obtained in Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Dorsetshire, 

 Somersetshire, Devonshire, rather numerously in Cornwall ; 

 also in Gloucestershire, Worcestershire, Aberystwith in 

 Wales, and in Middlesex and other counties along the 

 Thames valley. In the north the occurrences of the Spoon- 

 bill are far more rare, but Mr. Clarke enumerates nine 

 instances in Yorkshire. 



In Scotland it has been observed in East Lothian ; also 

 in the Outer Hebrides. In the Orkneys, besides the instance 

 already mentioned by Sibbald, six young birds were shot out 

 of two flocks, in October 1859, and the species has been 

 obtained in Shetland. 



