PLECTROPHANES NIVALIS. 117 
I have seen specimens obtained there, and met with a pair 
in April near Jebel Moosa. 
On the Spanish side of the Straits it is a common and, 
hke most of the Buntings, a stupidly tame bird, as far as my 
experience goes, living about stony, rocky, and hilly ground. 
Till 1 874 I never noticed thom perching on trees ; but in the 
spring of that year I saw three different birds, when dis- 
turbed, settle on trees and bushes. At Gibraltar they are met 
with in winter, but disappear in the spring. I have shot them 
at the back of the Rock when looking for Alpine Accentors, 
in company with which birds I have seen them feeding on 
the refuse-heap at the signal-station. In April they keep to 
the slopes and tops of the sierras, nesting during that month. 
154. Emberiza schceniclus, Linn. The Reed-Bunting. 
Included by Favier in his list as " rare near Tangier ; met 
with in December." I imagine that he considered it rare 
from not observing the females or young birds, which on the 
Andalucian side are, during the winter months, very plentiful 
in wet suitable localities ; the more conspicuous, old, black- 
headed males, with the ringed neck, are not so common. 
Thev are most abundant near Gibraltar from December to 
February ; and I have seen them on passage as late as the 
7th of April. They do not remain to nest in the sotos at Casa 
Vieja ; but near Seville, where they are often sold in cages 
under the name of Hortolano, I have seen them in May, and 
have no doubt that they there remain throughout the 
breeding-season. 
155. Plectrophanes NIVALIS (Linn.). The Snow-Bunting. 
The Snow- Bunting has only been recorded once from the 
Moorish side of the Straits ; and this occasion was mentioned 
by Mr. Drake in his list of the birds of Morocco, published in 
* The Ibis ' for 1867 (p. 427) . This specimen, lately in the 
possession of Olcese (Favier's successor at Tangier), was a 
female, and in fine plumage. 
I never heard of an instance of the occurrence of the 
Snow-Bunting in Andalucia. 
