17 



Photographing Birds on a South Coast Beach. 



By C. W. CoLTHRUP. Bead February 2Gth, 1914. 



Last June we spent a couple of days on Eomney Marsh photo- 

 graphing some of the shore birds that make the South Coast 

 shingle beaches their home during the nesting season. 



On the way from the railway station we passed within twelve yards 

 of, and without disturbing, a lapwing sitting on eggs. Had we been 

 walking this bird would have left its eggs when we were still some 

 distance off. In like manner a stone curlew, or Norfolk plover as 

 it is also called — one of the most wary of birds — will allow a man 

 on horseback to ride quite close to it, without showing any concern. 



Hares, voles, partridges, coots, moorhens, yellow wagtails and 

 many other species of birds, were seen as we passed the dykes that 

 intersect the marsh; the piping note of the redshank warning all 

 and sundry of our approach. 



Leaving the marsh proper behind we missed the bleating of the 

 sheep which are reared there in enormous numbers every year, but 

 our attention was immediately arrested by the extensive masses 

 of foxgloves, etc., that grow in luxuriance out of the bare 

 shingle. Arriving at our destination, a fisherman's cottage, we 

 made the necessary arrangements for conveyance back, as we were 

 quite isolated from the outside world. No post or telegraph office 

 within four miles and no other habitation save the coastguards'. 

 After a good meal and a rough survey of our surroundings we 

 retired for the night. Kising at five o'clock the next morning we 

 stepped direct from our bed-room out on the beach, and our eyes 

 were at once charB:red by a large mass of the pink flowers of the sea- 

 thrift gro\\ing outside. After an early breakfast we set oft' with our 

 assistant, shouldering the camera, tent, and other necessary tackle. 



Glorious places are these southern beaches on a fine day, where 

 one can wander for miles without fear bf molestation, Skylarks 

 are singing everywhere, meadow pipits uttering their character- 

 istic drawn out notes — sip- sip-sip as they parachute to the ground. 

 A wheatear calling chack-chak flies ahead, settles on a stone, flirts 

 its tail, as though urgmg us on, and repeats the performance till we 

 are well out of range of its nest, and then leaves us. 



We next hear the low whistle of a ringed plover, the male giving 

 warning to its mate, who rises behind a bank of shingle, and flies 

 around us, executing the most extraordinary evolutions in the air, 

 all the while repeating softly, yet forcibly, three notes which sound 



