164 SECOND VISIT TO THE NORTH OF KENT 
high on some branch blown about by the 
wind, whence his cognomen, the stovm-cock 
or storm thrush. The birds are great fighters. 
The food is like that of the blackbird and 
song thrush, but it is very fond of berries. 
It was once believed that mistletoe berries 
had to be swallowed and voided by these 
birds before they would germinate, hence 
missel-thrush. (I used to think it was named 
from the large mistletoe-berry shaped spots 
on the breast.) The bird must not be con- 
founded with the fieldfare, a somewhat 
shorter and narrower thrush-like bird, which 
is a winter visitor only, and which has a dark 
ereyish-blue head, neck, and back, and a 
reddish-brown breast on which there are 
triangular blackish-brown spots. I knew it as 
the blue thrush when a boy, from the colour 
of the back. It frequently utters a ‘chack, 
chack, ‘chack’ as it flies; by which #agce 
you would at once know it (see also 
notes on song thrush in Part I, p. 20). 
The flesh of the missel thrush, like that of the 
