ro6 iBritish Birds ^ 



plumage, was re-christened by the name of Snow 

 Bunting, to suit its winter dress, while the young bird 

 was called by the name of Mountain Bunting. 



REED BUNTING— (£'M^m>^ schceniclus). 



Reed Sparrow, Water Sparrow, Mountain Sparrow, 

 Black-headed Bunting, Black-bonnet. — Not a rare 

 bird anywhere in England, I believe, where water is 

 not rare ; and very conspicuous from the dark head 

 and bright plumage of the male. On the Essex 

 marshes it is common enough, and so it is in the 

 marshy or ill-drained meadows of other counties. Mr. 

 Yarrell says the "nest is generally placed on the 

 ground, among coarse long grass or rushes, at the foot 

 of a thorn, or on the side of a canal bank." The last 

 I found was among, and supported by, the sedges 

 growing at the side of a marsh- ditch in Essex, and not 

 less than ten or twelve inches from the bank — a site 

 which I believe is not an unusual one. It is made of 

 grasses, fragments of rushes, stalks of different plants, 

 and lined sometimes with reed-down, or finer grasses 

 and a little moss. I dislodged the male bird from the 

 nest just named, and the eggs were perfectly warm to 

 the touch. They would have been hatched in a few 

 days. It was thus proved that the male Reed Bunting 

 takes his share in sitting, and the position of the nest 

 among green and growing sedges adds one more fact 

 to what is known of its nidification. The eggs are 

 four or five in number, of a pale reddish-brown colour, 

 streaked and spotted with dark brown of a rich purple 

 shade. — Fig, % plate IV. 



