HEN-HARRIERS 147 



especially those on level ground are on the 

 brink of a ' ' sheep-drain ' ' (obviously to provide 

 for drainage purposes during heavy rain), as those 

 miniature cuttings in the peat are called. Some 

 nests, however, are half way up a brae in shorter 

 heather ; or even in a mere depression in the soil, 

 where, at some time or another, a peat brick or two 

 have been removed. Nests on the hill-tops are 

 rarities indeed. 



If a sufficiently open space does not exist in 

 the spot selected, the bird tramples down the 

 adjacent growth of heather and rushes, so forming 

 a rough, circular patch of from 20 in. to 25 in. 

 in diameter. This provides a site for the nest 

 which is made of heather, the finest twigs being 

 reserved for the lining, further augmented by a 

 little dead grass and often rushes. Some nests, 

 indeed, are quite thickly and neatly finished off with 

 broken bits of dead rush right up to the rim, a 

 fact which has been doubted and denied by every 

 ornithological writer. In such cases the effect of 

 the pale eggs lying on a yellow matting is 

 distinctly pleasing. 



The nest is always shallow. Two more 

 examples I measured were respectively 12^ in. by 

 13 in. across, by IJin. deep, and 15 in. by 17in. 

 by 1 in. deep. All the same, as incubation 

 advances, the whole structure is augmented daily, 

 as is the custom of Eagle, Kite, Buzzard, and 

 Sparrow-Hawk . 



L 2 



