120 THE STARLINGS 



and fly down to their chosen feeding ground. The regularity with 

 which the detachments will, day after day, descend to the same spot 

 is well illustrated by the behaviour of a small band of a dozen birds 

 which were seen to alight on the same tree every morning after 

 separating from their fellows. 1 



Starlings do not confine themselves to roosting in trees, bushes, 

 and reeds. The roof of St. Patrick's Cathedral, in the heart of 

 Dublin, has provided a nightly sanctuary for hundreds. 2 Many have 

 been seen resorting to the barrel-shaped beacons on the Clyde. 

 The tap of an oar on the side of one of these would cause it to 

 be filled with a sudden uproar, which ceased only when its startled 

 occupants had made their exit through the bung-hole, which they 

 did with small loss of time. 3 Starlings have also been known to roost 

 on the ground in a ploughed field, 4 in long stubble, 5 in the caves 

 and crevices of maritime cliffs, 6 and in their nest-holes, of which 

 more presently. 



With the nature of the roost is intimately connected those 

 movements from one roost to another which occur at certain periods 

 of the autumn and winter, and are not yet fully understood. The 

 usual date at which, towards the close of the breeding season, a 

 winter roost begins to be frequented, chiefly by the young of the 

 year, is the middle of June. The number of its nightly guests will, 

 as a rule, go on increasing till about October; but whether it will 

 after that cease gradually to be visited, or only so by reduced 

 numbers, or whether these numbers will, on the contrary, largely be 

 augmented, appears to depend partly upon the nature of the roost 

 itself, and partly upon the general migratory movements which are 

 performed by starlings at this time of the year. The evidence 

 available is as yet scanty, but such as it is, it points to the likeli- 

 hood of the following conclusions being correct. Reed-beds, unless 



1 Annals of Scottish Natural History, 1902, p. 2 (Ch. Campbell). 



2 Ussher and Warren, Birds of Ireland, p. 79. 3 Gray, Birds of the West of Scotland. 

 * Zoologist, 1900, p. 141. & Saxby, Birds' of Shetland, p. 116. 



6 Macgillivray, History of Birds, vol. i. 



