Il6 WHITE WAGTAIL. 



land. In Ireland it is of very rare occurrence, and perhaps the only 

 authenticated example is that shot by Mr. R. Warren in co. Mayo 

 on April 25th 1851. 



The White Wagtail is a summer-visitor to the Faeroes and Iceland, 

 straggling to the island of Jan Mayen and the south of Greenland. 

 On the Continent it is found over the whole of Europe and of Northern 

 Asia ; Siberian birds being of a purer grey on the upper parts, and 

 wintering in India and Burma ; while the ordinary form occurs in 

 Asia Minor, Palestine and Northern Africa, in summer and winter, 

 visiting Senegambia on the west and Zanzibar on the east in the 

 latter season. It is one of the earliest species to return to the 

 northern summer quarters from which cold and want of food force 

 it to migrate at the end of autumn ; the males arriving about a 

 week before the females. It has recently been found in Madeira. 



The situations selected for its nest are similar to those chosen 

 by its congener ; but the White ^^'agtail has further been known 

 to breed in the burrow of a Sand-Martin, and also to make its nest 

 in an open place in the middle of a strawberry-bed. The eggs, 

 5-7, are sometimes of a rather bluer grey, with bolder ashy mark- 

 ings, than those of the Pied Wagtail ; but frequently they cannot be 

 distinguished, and their average measurements are identical. In 

 general habits, food and haunts, the White Wagtail hardly differs 

 from our indigenous bird • and in spite of assertions that it does 

 not follow the plough, I have seen flocks whitening the furrows in 

 Spain and the south of France, as Mr. Gurney jun. has in Algeria. 



The adult male in breeding-plumage has the forehead and the sides 

 of the head and neck white ; crown and nape black ; back, rump 

 and upper wing-coverts ash-grey, the latter and the median ones 

 tipped with white ; quills blackish, the long inner secondaries edged 

 outside with white ; tail-feathers black, except the two outer pairs 

 which are mainly white ; chin, throat, and breast black ; abdomen 

 white; flanks grey; bill, legs and feet black. Length 7-5 in. ; 

 wing 3*5 in. The female has a shorter tail; her colours are less 

 pure, and the black portions are more restricted. After the autumn 

 moult the chin and throat are white, and the black is reduced to a 

 crescentic band. In the young the white forehead, cheeks and throat 

 are tinged with yellow, and the head and mantle are olive-grey, but 

 males soon show white on the forehead and a little black on the 

 crown. By the following spring the olive tint has disappeared, 

 and the young have a remarkably light appearance. 



