Letters, Extracts, and Notes. 183 



Tits in eastern Ross-shire may, I think, safely be considered 

 a very recent extension northward of the species. About 

 tlie progress of its extension within the confines of 

 Strathspey and tributaries of the River Spey, I had with 

 considerable minuteness gathered all the data available 

 many years ago, and had kept the subject up-to-date, to 

 the issue of Buckley's and my ' Fauna of Moray.' 



With reference to the entry in ' The Catalogue of the 

 Collection of Birds' Eggs in the British Museum/ vol. iv. 

 p. 304 — '^ 4. Ross-shire (/. Hancock: Tristram Coll., 

 Crowley Bequest) " — I cannot help thinking there is some 

 mistake here as to locality. The two persons' names who 

 were associated with collecting done for Hancock and 

 John Wolley were Alexander MacDouald of Balnagown, 

 E. Ross-shire, and Lewis Dunbar. Most of the collecting 

 by the latter at that period was confined to the Spey Valley 

 and to taking eggs of Osprey, Kite^ &c., and in response to 

 Mr. Gould's offer of ,£5 — a nest of four eggs of the 

 Crested Tit. Hancock and Lewis Dunbar were together 

 at an Osprey site at Glenmore, and it is possible, indeed 

 likely, that on that occasion a Crested Tit's nest may have 

 been found. I myself have found the nest of the species 

 quite near to the said Osprey site ! 



Now that Mr. Ogilvie-Graut has recorded the appearance 

 of the species in eastern Ross-shire, it may reasonably be 

 expected that such an extension of range in autumn may, 

 later ou, result in true extension of nesting range ; and the 

 perfectly suitable woods and plantations of eastern Ross-shire 

 and old-time haunts of the Crossbill and Siskin may come 

 to be occupied by a species, whose past extensions have been 

 fairly accurately traced from a comparatively small area in 

 Speyside to cover many miles in length and breadth, and 

 down the plateaus of Strathspey, even as far as Fochabers, 

 and also over the valley's rims in several directions, and in 

 the tributary valleys. 

 Dunipace, Stirlingshire. Yours truly, 



Dec. 6, 1915. J. A. Harvie-Brown. 



