The Dipper. 137 



Family— CINCLIDAi. 



The Dipper. 



Ciiiclus aquaticia, BechST. 



COMMON and widely distributed though this conspicuous bird is, I have never 

 met with it in a wild state since I first began to study the class Avcs : it 

 is likely enough that prior to that period I may have seen it in some of 

 the wilder parts of Devon without taking special note of the fact. 



Dr. Sharpe (Catalogue of Birds, Vol. VI) says: — "The common White-throated 

 Dipper is widely spread over Central and Western Europe. It has been said to 

 occur in the P'aroes, and is found throughout Ireland in suitable localities, as 

 well as Scotland with the Hebrides, and breeds in the northern and central 

 counties of England, as well as in Wales and the south-western counties. In 

 other counties it is an accidental visitor. 



The upper surface of the Dipper is slaty-grey, each feather with a dark- 

 brownish margin, but the head and nape are whollj' brown, wings dark-brown, the 

 quills with greyish edges ; tail greyish-brown ; chin, throat, and front of breast 

 white ; remainder of under parts chestnut-brown, passing into dark smoky-brown 

 on the flanks, thighs, vent, and under tail coverts ; bill black ; feet brown ; iris 

 hazel. 



The female is very like the male, but is said to be darker on the flanks and 

 under tail-coverts. The young are greyer above, and show no chestnut-brown on 

 the under surface. 



Seebohm says : — " The haunts of the Dipper are exclusively confined to the 

 swift-flowing rocky mountain-streams. On these he is found all the 3^ear round, 

 in places where the waters now curl over hidden rocks, or dash round the exposed 

 and mossy ones, and toss and fall in never-ceasing strife. The banks must be 

 rugged also to suit the Dipper, all the better if in the rock-clefts a few mountain- 

 ashes and birches have gained a good hold. But a Dipper is not a bird of the 

 branches. You will make your first acquaintance with him most probably as he 

 dashes rapidly from some water-encircled rock, or as he shoots past you uttering 

 his sharp but monotonous call-note, to alight on some distant stone, or mayhap 

 seek the boiling current itself, to astonish and amuse you by his aquatic gambols. 



