MUSCICAPID.'E. 



151 



THE PIED FLYCATCHER. 



MusciCAPA atricapi'lla, Linnteus. 



Although far less numerous than the preceding species, the Pied 

 Flycatcher is a regular visitor to Great Britain, arriving in the latter 

 part of April and returning southward in autumn. Large numbers 

 have sometimes been observed during the first week in May on the 

 Pentland Skerries, the Isle of ALay, and Flamborough and Spurn in 

 Yorkshire; and a return migration has been noticed in August and 

 September ; while in the latter month immense flights have passed 

 over Heligoland. During the breeding-season it is a very local 

 species, and although nests are said to have been found occasion- 

 ally in Devon, Somerset, Dorset, Hants, Surrey, Middlesex, Oxford, 

 Gloucester and some of the other southern counties, its favourite 

 haunts are rather in the north and west. In portions of Wales, 

 such as Brecon, Denbigh and Merioneth, and in the English coun- 

 ties of the Welsh border, it nests annually ; also in Lancashire, 

 some parts of Y^orkshire, Durham and Northumberland ; but its 

 head-quarters are in Westmoreland and Cumberland, where it ap- 



