WOULD A-WOOING GO 



THE courting rites of the peewits while still in flocks, 

 and their incessant search in these days 

 The for what they consider ideal nesting-sites 



Wailing on the marsh, make a delightful March 

 Whaups study. Sportsmen often argue, selfishly 

 but well, that no birds are more useful to 

 man. They are exemplary in their work for the farmer, 

 never thieving, but ever destroying pests. The virtue 

 in plovers' eggs is emphasized, and the pretty sport the 

 birds give to the wildfowler. More to the point is the 

 fascination of their flight these March days, as the 

 flocks wheel and dip, and the Spring is in their cries, 

 however plaintive and wistful. 



THE musical, but to some ears, somewhat eerie call of 

 the golden plover is now heard again on 

 Whistling the northern moors where it nests. One 

 Plover Spring call is rendered by the syllables 

 " Tirr-pee-you ! " uttered on the wing; 

 besides the plaintive whistle there is a peculiar rippling 

 note in courting days, comparable to the drumming of 

 snipe. Only on its native heath is the concealing quality 

 of its gold-speckled plumage fully revealed. On the 

 nest it is well-nigh invisible, since, like the grouse, it 

 tones in magically with heather, and this in spite of 

 its black and old gold of the upper parts. 



THE return last week of a great crested grebe, complete 

 with chestnut frill, to a pond where it 

 Lovelorn built a floating nest last summer, made the 

 Loons day red-lettered for some of the bird's 



human friends. A fine figure it cuts, swim- 

 ming with head held on high, and in a nervous way 



37 



