88 BIRDS OF LANCASHIRE. 



HOODED CROW. 



CoRvus coRNix, Linnaeus. 



Local Name — Manx Crow. 



A winter visitor, only seen as a straggler inland, and 

 more commonly noticed on the coast, though it is much 

 rarer there than it used to be. It is seldom seen before 

 October, Blackwall's dates of arrival and departure 

 being October 30 and April 13, but Mr. John Weld saw 

 seven birds among Eooks in the meadows of Leagram 

 Hallin 1876 on August 15, an early date. It was very 

 common on Martin Mere, near Southport, before it was 

 so entirely reclaimed, and John Cookson, an old fowler 

 there, told Mr. R. J. Howard that it was a perfect 

 nuisance, for if a duck were winged or killed, and not 

 recovered before night, the Hoodies would find it at day- 

 break and pick it clean. Of Martin Mere, Baines 

 (" Hist, of Lancashire," 1868-70, vol. ii. p. 431) says it 

 "originally comprised 3,132 statute acres of land," and 

 Leland ("Itinerary," Oxford, 1770, vol. vii. p. 49) nearly 

 300 years ago described it as " the greatest meare of 

 Lancastreshire a iiii. miles in Lengthe and a iii. in 

 Bredthe." In 1693 Thomas Fleetwood of Bank Hall 

 began to drain it, and in 1849-50 Sir Thomas Dal- 

 rymple Hesketh of Rufford drained his portion, and 

 brought 800 acres of land into cultivation. Parts of it 

 are still swampy, and are occasionally flooded, but no 

 portion is constantly under water. Dr. Leigh in his "Nat. 

 Hist, of Lancashire" (pp. 158-9), published in 1700, says 

 of the Sea-Crow,* which I take to be the species under 



* Willnghby (" Ornithology," eel. Ray, 1678) says that " Mr. 

 Ealph Johnson calls the Eoyston (Hooded) Crow the Sea-Crow." 



