ZOOLOGY. 



RECORDS FOR WOOLWICH AND WEST KENT. 



Edited by J. W. TUTT, F.E.S. 



PREFACE. 



The Zoological Section of our "Handbook" has been somewhat 

 hurried, and must suffer in consequence. Still, it is hoped that it will 

 prove a sound and useful basis, on which something more thorough 

 and complete can be constructed at leisure. 



The gradual extension of the suburban districts has resulted 

 in the destruction of many well-known collecting-grounds, the 

 consequent extermination locally of many species, and, also, to a 

 certain extent, an alteration in the balance of species. The latter 

 feature has been particularly well illustrated in the gradual con- 

 version of Greenwich Marshes into building land. Until 1887, a 

 great deal of the Marshes retained much of its original character, 

 and many exceedingly local species belonging to a distinctively 

 " marsh " fauna abounded. During the next ten years, the filling 

 up, with material dredged from the Thames, of the greater part of 

 the marsh to a depth of from 6 ft. 12 ft., absolutely exterminated 

 some insect species, but the temporary use of the land for the 

 purpose of market gardens led to the development of counties* 

 numbers in other species, which were in quite ordinary numbers 

 previously. 



This destruction of particular and limited localities, however, 

 has not resulted in anything like the absolute extermination of 

 species throughout the whole area under review, that some of our 



