THE KESTRELS. 2O; 



and grasshoppers. He says that the stairs and other approaches 

 to the towers frequented by this and the larger Kestrel are 

 often " covered with an accumulation of wing-cases and ejected 

 pellets of indigestible matter." In general habits, flight, and 

 cry the present species is said by Lord Lilford to resemble the 

 Common Kestrel, but in his opinion it is a more entirely in- 

 sectivorous bird, and takes its prey on the ground. He writes : 

 " The two species of Kestrel are, I think, in April and May, 

 the commonest birds in Andalucia, with perhaps the exception 

 of the Bee-Eater. Every church-steeple, belfry, and tower, 

 every town and village, every ruin, swarms with them. I 

 believe I am not at all beyond the mark in saying that I have 

 seen three or four hundred on the wing at the same moment 

 on more than one occasi n, notably at Castro del Rio in April, 

 1864. Both species of Kestrel continue on the wing long 

 after sunset." 



Nest. No nest is made by this little Kestrel, and the eggs 

 are generally laid in a hole of a building, sometimes within 

 reach of the ground. In the Crimea, Colonel Irby found 

 them nesting in holes in banks. 



Eggs. Four or five in number, though occasionally as many 

 as seven are found. Although some of them are marked like 

 the Common Kestrel's, and are only to be distinguished from 

 the eggs of the latter by their smaller size, the series in the 

 British Museum is undoubtedly paler and more cinnamon in 

 tint than the eggs of C. tinnunculus. The eggs are minutely 

 spotted with rufous, and less boldly blotched than the eggs of 

 the preceding species, and the markings always seem to me to 

 be smaller in character. Axis, 1*3-1 '5 inch; diam., n-i'2. 



III. THE RED-FOOTED KESTREL. CERCHNEIS VESPERTINA. 



Falco vespertinus. Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 129 (1766); Macg. 



Brit. B. iii. p. 313 (1840); Newt. ed. Yarr. Brit. B. i. p. 



69(1871) ; Dresser, B. Eur. vi. p. 93, pi. 382 (1871); Seeb. 



Brit. B. i. p. 42 (1883) ; Saunders, Man. Brit. B. p. 339 



(1889). 

 Cerchneis vespertina, Sharpe, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. i. p. 443 



(1874). 

 Tinnunculus vespertinus, B. O. U. List Brit. B. p. 103(1883). 



