64 OUR RARER BRITISH BREEDING BIRDS. 



takes sticks from the ground, but always breaks 

 them off some decaying tree. 



A neighbouring keeper told me that he once 

 saw one of the Ospreys living on the loch, which 

 must for obvious reasons remain nameless, plunge 

 after a fish which was so large that it nearly 

 dragged its would-be captor out of sight under 

 the water, and that after a struggle lasting quite 

 five minutes the bird ^was obliged to release its 

 quarry, in all probability a large pike. 



Our illustration, forming the frontispiece to 

 this work, was taken with one of Dallmeyer's 

 telephoto lenses, which my brother worked whilst 

 standing waist-deep in the loch, where he waited 

 for two hoars in weather none too bright or warm. 



OWL, LONG-EARED. 



THE Long-Eared Owl although not often seen 

 on account of its nocturnal habits, and the fact 

 that it lives principally in dark fir and spruce 

 plantations is much more numerous than would 

 at first sight appear to be the case, in spite of 

 the fact that it meets with scant mercy at the 

 hands of many gamekeepers. My friend Mr. J. J. 

 Baldwin - Young tells me that it is quite common 

 for a bird of its class amongst some of the Lin- 

 colnshire woods, and that he has seen the ground 

 for yards together under favourite trees littered 

 with its castings, and adds that the good it does 

 to neighbouring farmers must be very great. 



Although the bird generally adopts the old 

 nest of a Crow, Heron, Wood Pigeon, Magpie, or 

 an ancient squirrel's drey, it occasionally departs 



