THE BLACKBIRD 7 
eggs, although we afterwards found that five was more commonly 
the number than four, and that even six was very frequent ; they 
are very similar to those of the Blackbird, and even more so to 
the Ring Ouzel. The Fieldfare is the most abundant bird in Nor- 
way, and is generally diffused over that part which we visited, 
building, as already noticed, in society; two hundred nests or 
more being frequently seen within a very small space.’ Oddly 
enough two hundred was just the number of a colony of nests in 
Thiiringen on the estate of Baron von Berlepsch, which were those 
of Fieldfares he had induced to come by trimming the trunks of 
a long row of Black Poplar trees so as to afford good sites for the nests. 
The present editor visited these in 1906. Some few instances are 
on record of the Fieldfare breeding in this country, but these are 
exceptional. In general they leave us in April and May, though 
they have been observed as late as the beginning of June. 
THE BLACKBIRD 
TURDUS MERULA 
Male—plumage wholly black ; bill and orbits of the eyes orange yellow ; feet 
black. Female—upper plumage sooty brown; throat pale brown with 
darker spots; breast reddish brown passing into dark ash brown; bill 
and legs dusky. Length ten inches; breadth sixteen inches. Eggs 
greenish grey, spotted and speckled with light red brown. 
WitH his glossy coat and yellow beak the Blackbird is a hand- 
somer bird than the Thrush ; his food is much the same: he builds 
his nest in similar places; he is a great glutton when gooseberries 
are ripe, and his rich mellow song is highly inspiriting. But he 
is suspicious and wary ; however hard pressed he may be by hunger, 
you will rarely see him hunting for food in the open field. He 
prefers the solitude and privacy of ‘the bush’. In a furze-brake, 
a coppice, a wooded water-course, or a thick hedgerow, he chooses 
his feeding ground, and allows no sort of partnership. Approach 
his haunt, and if he simply mistrusts you, he darts out flying 
close to the ground, pursues his course some twenty yards and 
dips again into the thicket, issuing most probably on the other 
side, and ceasing not until he has placed what he considers a safe 
distance between himself and his enemy. But with all his cunning 
he fails in prudence ; it is not in his nature to steal away silently. 
If he only suspects that all is not right, he utters repeatedly a low 
cluck, which seems to say, ‘ This is no place for me, I must be off’. 
But if he is positively alarmed, his loud vociferous cry rings out 
like a bell, informing all whom it may concern that ‘ danger is at 
hand, and it behoves all who value their safety to fly’. Most 
animals understand the cry in this sense, and catch the alarm. 
Many a time has the deer-stalker been disappointed of a shot, who, 
after traversing half a mile on his hands and knees between rocks 
