S CO LOP ACID z^.. 



547 



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BLACK-WINGED STILT. 



HiMANTOPUS CANDiDUS, Bonnatcrre. 



The occurrence of the Black-winged Stilt in the British Islands 

 was noticed as long ago as 1684 by Sir Robert Sibbald, who 

 described and figured one of two examples which had been shot 

 at a lake near the town of Dumfries. Since that date a few more 

 have been obtained or observed, at long intervals, on the mainland 

 of Scotland as well as in the Orkneys and Shetlands ; while two 

 are recorded from Yorkshire, one from Lincolnshire, and one from 

 Notts : but it is only on reaching Norfolk — where twelve in all 

 have been taken — that the species becomes fairly frequent. Suffolk, 

 Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire and a few inland counties have also 

 been visited, while in the south of England, from Kent to Cornwall, 

 a good many specimens have been procured from time to time ; on 

 the west side, however, it is very rare, though Montagu mentions 

 one from Anglesea. In Ireland it has been met with on five or six 

 occasions. As a rule the occurrences in the British Islands have 



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