70 THE WARBLERS 



photographing the willow-wrens. Food for the Tits can be put 

 near some dahlia-stick, or convenient perching-place, and the 

 presence of the Tits as they come to feed is very likely to attract 

 the willow-wrens to the spot." 1 The willow-wren's curious fancy 

 is possibly the result of force of custom ; it finds it difficult to 

 forget that it is no longer in its nesting area, where every intruder 

 is a trespasser. 



The wood-warblers, though the last to arrive in the spring, 

 are the first to depart in the autumn. All appear to have gone 

 before the end of August, that is, by the time when the chiff- 

 chaffs and willow-warblers are only beginning to leave. The 

 emigration of both the latter goes on till October, and occasionally 

 individuals stay with us throughout the winter. Montagu saw a 

 pair of chiffchaffs in S. Devon in January "busied in catching- 

 small winged insects, which a bright day had roused in great 

 abundance about some fir-trees." Two years later (1808) a pair 

 were seen in the same fir-trees. Similar occurrences have been 

 noted by subsequent observers, who have corrected Montagu's 

 statement that the chiffchaffs are "wholly silent in the winter." 

 It is possible, therefore, in our Isles, to hear the herald of spring- 

 even in the middle of winter. 2 



THE MARSH-WARBLERS 

 [By WILLIAM FARREN] 



The small group of warblers which constitute the genus 

 Acrocephalus all frequent more or less marshy country. They are 

 lively, merry birds, and although very secretive in their habits, generally 

 keeping to the cover of reed-beds and osiers or the dense masses of 

 vegetation peculiar to damp places, they betray their presence by their 



1 Granville Sharpe : Birds in a Garden, p. 108, in which are photos taken by the device 

 above mentioned. 



J Ussher and Warren, Birds of Ireland, p. 20. 



