PIED FLYCATCHER 27 



Only one brood is reared in the year, though if the 

 first " set " of eggs is destroyed a second, and if 

 this goes even a third, is produced, sometimes, 

 indeed, in the same nest, if the hole has not been 

 too greatly tampered with. Incubation, almost 

 the sole prerogative of the female, lasts twelve or 

 thirteen days, and although she does not begin 

 to brood till the clutch is complete, she nevertheless 

 frequents the nest periodically while laying is in 

 progress. 



Conspicuous though the male is, the home of 

 the Pied Flycatcher is not always found for the 

 mere asking : since, contrary to the custom of most 

 hole-breeders, which even when their eggs are 

 fresh often remain brooding till removed bodily, 

 the female quite constantly slips out of her dwelling 

 at her husband's cry of warning, while the intruder 

 is still some way off. Then the surest road towards 

 success will have lain in having accurately marked 

 the spot where the cock was first seen or heard, 

 since he is particularly enamoured of singing very 

 close to his belongings ; afterwards, by sitting 

 down quietly in view of that spot. Presently both 

 birds begin to flit anxiously about in the vicinity of 

 the tenanted hole, for there are often to your 

 confusion several ' ' possibles ' ' in fairly close 

 proximity. If chary about actually entering it 

 for some little while, they none the less indicate the 

 right hole by keeping remarkably close to it, while 

 from time to time they utter their simple notes of 



