182 THE TITS 



letter-boxes, pumps, old cans, street lamps, flowerpots, etc. A few cases of nests 

 in holes of banks are on record, and in default of holes, old nests of other species of 

 birds have been relined and utilised, while the nest has also been found in the bottom 

 of a rook's nest. It is composed of moss and dead grass, with a thick felted lining 

 of hair and wool and generally a good many feathers. (PI. 64.) Apparently both 

 sexes take part in building. Eggs usually from 7 or 8 to 12 in number, and probably 

 in those cases where from 17 to 24 eggs have been found in one nest, two hens have 

 contributed their quota. They are white, finely spotted or speckled with light red- 

 brown, sometimes with a zone or cap, and occasionally unmarked. (PL D. ) Average 

 size of 100 eggs, -60 x -46 in. [15-3 x 11 -9 mm.]. Eggs may be found from the end 

 of April in the south to about the third week in May further north as a rule. 

 Incubation lasts 13-14 days (W. Evans), and according to Naumann both sexes 

 incubate in turn. Only one brood is raised as a rule. [F. c. R. J.] 



5. Food. Insects, many of which are injurious to man; also occasionally 

 buds and fruit. In winter it feeds largely on nuts, acorns and seeds of the larch. 

 The young are fed by both parents on insects and their larvae. [E. L. T.] 



6. Song Period. About the same as the great-tit (i.e. from mid- August to 

 mid-June), but it sings rather more in August and less in September and October 

 than that species (C. J. and H. G. Alexander, Br. Birds, iv. p. 275). [E. L. T.] 



CONTINENTAL BLUE-TIT [Pants cceruleus cceruleus Linnaeus. 

 French, mesange bleue ; German, Blaumeise ; Italian, cinciarella], 



1. Description. Differs from the British species, according to Dr. Hartert, in 

 being brighter, more yellowish green on the back, in being generally rather larger, 

 in having a comparatively more slender beak, and the white tips to the inner 

 secondaries larger, [w. p. p.] 



2. Distribution. This race, which only visits our shores on migration, is 

 widely distributed over the Continent of Europe, except in the north of Scandinavia 

 and Russia, while in Corsica, North-west Africa, the Canarian group, and probably 

 the Urals, as well as in Western Asia, it is replaced by other races. [F. c. R. J.] 



3. Migration. The autumn and spring movements of this race to and from 

 the east of Great Britain correspond closely with those already described for the 

 great-tit. Indeed, the two species very frequently travel in company, and the blue-tit 

 also participated in the specially marked migrations on Heligoland and our own 

 east coast, in the autumn of 1878 (see antea, p. 175). As regards Ireland, the Con- 



