182 FIRST APPEARANCES OF BIRDS, INSECTS, ETC. 



casual " trespassing," and the latter will be fortified by the 

 kind assistance of the Rev. E. F. Lin ton. 



It is a matter for reproach that we have so few observers 

 ready to fill our schedules, seeing the number of our Members ; 

 and this fact was brought prominently before me some time 

 since, when I was asked to inform the Brit. Ornithological 

 Union on the distribution and frequency of occurrence of 

 the Nightingale in West Dorset. In fact, Mr. Rodd is the 

 most westerly of our observers, and so I could only reply to 

 the B.O.U. that little or nothing was really known as to the 

 distribution of the Nightingale in West Dorset. Accordingly 

 I appeal to those of our Members who are able and willing to 

 make careful and accurate records to send returns. 



I might perhaps here correct a mistake in the last report 

 (Vol. XXXIV., p. 205), due to the state of flux that our 

 scientific nomenclature is in at the present time, as a result of 

 a failure to adhere to the Strickland code. Mgiihalis vagans 

 = Acredula rosea the Long tailed Titmouse, and not Mgialitis 

 hiaticola-major, the British Ringed Plover. 



The observers seem sometimes to put the first appearances 

 of birds in the song column and vice versa ; no doubt on many 

 occasions the two dates are coincident, but it would be an 

 assistance to me, when the one column or other is not filled in, 

 if the observer would put a pen through the blank, as in some 

 cases where the birds are returned under the song column the 

 bird is much more easily noted than the song, e.g.,Muscicapa 

 grisola, with the result that one is in doubt as to whether the 

 date be in the correct column. 



The names (arranged alphabetically) of those who have 

 sent returns are as follows, the initials prefixed in brackets to 

 the names designate the responsibility for the record in the 

 notes hereafter : 



(E.H.C.) Eustace Barker Curtis ) . 

 (W.P.C.) W. Parkinson Curtis j A y s 8 arth > Poole ' 

 (W.H.D.) Revd. W. Hughes D'Aeth, Buckhorn Weston 

 Rectory, Wincanton. 



