BIRDS OF GUERNSEY. 153 



had shot Bitterns in that island, but did not 

 remember the date. 



The Bittern is included in Professor Ansted's 

 list, but only marked as occurring in Guernsey. 

 There is no specimen in the Museum. 



132. American Bittern. Botaurus hmtiginosus, 

 Montagu. French, " Heron lentigineux." * — This 

 occasional straggler from the New World has once, 

 in its wanderings, reached the Channel Islands, 

 and was shot in Guernsey on the 27th October, 

 1870, and was duly recorded by me in the ' Zoolo- 

 gist ' for 1871 ; it is now in my collection. This is 

 the only occurrence of this bird in the Channel 

 Islands yet recorded ; but as the bird occasionally 

 crosses to this side of the Atlantic — several speci- 

 mens having occurred in the British Islands — it 

 may possibly occur in Guernsey or some of the 

 Channel Islands again. It may, therefore, be as 

 well to point out the principal distinctions between 

 this bird and the Common Bittern last mentioned. 

 Between the adult birds there can be no mistake : 

 the longer and looser feathers on the fore part of 

 the neck, which are slightly streaked and freckled 

 with dark brown, may be immediately distinguished 

 from the much shorter and more regularly marked 

 feathers on the neck of the adult American Bittern. 

 This distinction, however, is not perfectly clear in 



'•' Temminck, ' Man. d'Ornitliologic' 



