DARTFORD-WARBLER 43 



as one of the Avian aristocrats not forcing himself obtrusively upon 

 society in general, but immediately on the defensive and able to 

 maintain his honour if attacked. He is unique in appearance, and 

 once seen, could not be confounded with any other species. 



Like another very local bird the bearded-tit although by no 

 means uncommon in the districts it frequents, while rearing two broods 

 at least each season, the Dartford-warbler does not materially increase 

 in numbers. This is partly accounted for by heath-fires which some- 

 times sweep across its nesting areas, dealing death and disaster ; but, 

 without doubt, severe winters and late, cold springs destroy a great 

 many. After a late fall of snow in April 1908 these birds ceased to 

 exist in certain localities where they formerly seemed numerous. 

 This was notably the case in some of the high, wind-swept, gorse- 

 clad heaths of Surrey and Sussex. Dr. J. H. Salter, writing from 

 Andernos, Gironde, observes that " upon these extensive heaths, 

 which cover several square miles, there must be some hundreds of 

 pairs of Dartford-warblers, their numbers not being kept down here as 

 in England by occasional severe winters." It has also unfortunately 

 suffered perhaps more than any other small bird from the greed of 

 the private collector, as the following extract from the Zoologist will 

 show : " Mr. C - told me that his collectors in the Churt district in 

 the 'sixties sent him some sixty or seventy clutches, including two with 

 cuckoos, all taken in that district. After 1869 a very large forest fire 

 destroyed the tract of furze-covered heaths where the birds had been 

 so common. A large number of birds were shot by collectors. Mr. 



C 's collection contained a splendid series of nests and eggs 



some forty clutches, the remainder of those he received having been 

 exchanged or given away. It is hardly a matter of wonder that this 

 species has become so rare in Surrey in view of the wholesale 

 destruction with which it appears to have been pursued about this 

 period, but it is evident that it was then extremely abundant in that 



neighbourhood." 



Zoologist, 1901, p. 250. 



