EUROPEAN AND BRITISH COAL TITS. 475 
the ‘ Field’ of its feeding on filberts; and Montagu states that a nest of 
young birds kept in a cage were fed chiefly on small green caterpillars. 
The flight of the Coal Tit differs very little from that of the Blue Tit. It 
is performed by rapid and incessant beats of the wings, and is seldom pro- 
longed for any great distance. 
The Coal Tit’s breeding-grounds are the birch-woods, pine- and fir-plan- 
tations, alder-swamps, and, more rarely, orchards and gardens. Karly in 
spring we hear this bird’s song—a performance scarcely deserving the 
name, it is true, but which is perhaps the closest attempt at music 
made by any of the Tits. The nest of the Coal Tit is generally found 
in holes of trees and stumps; but sometimes a hole in a wall will be 
selected. Birch-woods are favourite haunts of this bird during the breeding- 
season, where the abundance of holes suitable for nesting-purposes are most 
probably the chief attraction. Here, it may be, where a large limb has 
fallen in premature decay, leaving a hollow cavity in the parent stem, or 
where a trunk has been riven by the storm, the bird will build its nest. It 
will also select a hole in a large pine tree, or in the decaying alders near 
the stream. Orchard trees are more rarely chosen; but a hole in some 
stump in a hedgerow is a favourite place. The bird will also occasionally 
seek out a nesting-site in the ground, generally a hole under some half- 
exposed root or old stump. In some cases the bird will enlarge a hole for 
its purpose. The nest resembles those of the other Tits, and is very loosely 
put together. It is made of dry grass, moss, in some cases thickly felted 
with hair, and lined very warmly with feathers. The eggs, from five to 
eight or nine in number, are usually pure white spotted and freckled with 
light red. In some specimens the spots are bold and rich in colour, chiefly 
massed on the large end of the egg; in others they are evenly distributed 
over the entire surface in small dots. A beautiful clutch of eggs from 
Pomerania in my collection, nine in number, have the eround-colour 
delicate creamy white; many of the markings are confluent, and all are 
very pale and chiefly distributed in broad wavy streaks. One egg in this 
clutch has the colour distributed in the minutest of specks over the whole 
surface. They vary from ‘7 to ‘58 inch in length, and from °5 to ‘45 inch 
in breadth. 
The British form of the Coal Tit has the head, the sides of the nape, 
and throat black, glossed with blue on the former; the ear-coverts and 
the cheeks are yellowish white ; and the nape is white; the rest of the 
upper parts are brown; the wings and tail are greyish brown; the 
median and greater wing-coverts are tipped with dull white, forming a 
double bar across the wings; the breast and belly are dull white, shading 
into buffish brown on the flanks. Bill black; legs, feet, and claws lead- 
colour; irides hazel. Females are not so brilliant in colour, and the white 
patches of plumage are not so pure. The Coal Tit may at once be distin- 
guished from the Marsh-Tit by the white patch on the nape. 
: 
/ 
