BIRD NOTES 171 



A COEVINE IMMIGRATION 



18th and 19th October are always days of interest 

 to me, for under normal conditions various members 

 of the Crow tribe may be looked for coming in from 

 sea in greater or lesser numbers. On the first date 

 in 1903 a remarkable immigration set in, and on 

 the next day great "rushes" of Hooded Crows, 

 Rooks, Crows, Jackdaws, and Starlings, as well as 

 small perching birds, were observed passing overhead. 

 The whole day long, from dawn until night, inces- 

 sant streams the Rooks and Crows in straggling 

 flocks of from twelve to thirty in a flock were 

 leisurely pouring in as if they had had a fine passage 

 with no wind to tire them. The local wind was 

 south-westerly at the time. Hundreds of Jackdaws 

 in compact flocks, flying very high, passed over, for 

 once remarkably mute : their custom is to noisily 

 prate over their arrival. 



Most of the birds I saw appeared in no way 

 fatigued, although an intelligent fisherman informed 

 me subsequently that a number of Jackdaws and 

 others had dropped down upon the boom and 

 rigging of his drifter, as well as on others, for rest : 

 this was on the 20th, after a wet, baffling night. 



