56 THE NESTS AND EGGS OF BRITISH BIRDS. 



Yellow Bunting are agricultural districts ; wherever land 

 is tilled, even in the wildest localities, the bird may 

 almost invariably be met with during the nesting season. 

 It also frequents in some numbers commons and un- 

 cultivated waste grounds, both on the uplands and 

 the lowlands, and may be met with on the open spaces 

 in coppices and well-timbered country. The Yellow 

 Bunting pairs early in the year ; the love-song of the 

 male sounding persistently from the hedges and trees 

 from March onwards to the following autumn. The 

 nest is made in a variety of situations, both on the 

 ground and at various heights above it. A favourite 

 situation is on the bank of a hedge, either amongst the 

 roots of the shrubs or bushes, or amongst the grass and 

 other herbage. Another favourite spot is amongst 

 nettles and other similar rank vegetation. Less fre- 

 quently it is made in a gorse bush or a thicket of 

 brambles and briars, and even more rarely in a sapling 

 spruce fir. I have known the same spot used for several 

 years in succession. Indeed the Yellow Bunting is much 

 attached to a particular site, and frequently continues to 

 lay egg after egg, even should the nest be removed. The 

 nest is a rather bulky structure, loosely put together, but 

 remarkably neat and well finished inside. Externally 

 it is made of dry grass, bits of moss, roots and stalks 

 of plants, and internally of finer roots and horsehair. 

 Some nests, externally, are made almost exclusively of 

 one or the other of the above-mentioned materials. A 

 nest from Devonshire, now before me, is made entirely 

 of straw and dry grass (obtained from the manure in 

 a field near which it was taken), and lined with very 

 fine roots and a few hairs the whole stained very red 

 from contact with the Devonshire soil. The hen sits 

 closely, and leaves the nest in a silent manner, returning 

 almost directly the nest is left in peace. Sometimes 



