is no getting near them, as they are away long before the gunner can get 

 within shot. If one of the birds be shot out of a flock the others often 

 return and wheel round and round their dead companion, calling loudly. 

 When wounded, the Oyster-catcher often makes for the water, but it is no 

 great swimmer, its feathers soon becoming waterlogged, and it is not capable 

 of progressing at any speed. 



The food of the Oyster-catcher is chiefly composed of limpets, mussels, 

 and other molluscs, small crabs, sand-lice, small dead fish, and various kinds 

 of marine creatures. It is also said to eat small pieces of marine plants. They 

 are most regular in their feeding-hours, which are controlled by the rise and 

 fall of the tide, and may be seen every day at the same state of the tide flying 

 along with rapid beats of their wings to their accustomed feeding-grounds. 



About the end of April the Oyster-catchers select a nesting site, eggs being 

 very seldom laid before the second week in May, though in some districts they 

 are much later. The bird is not very fond of sand unless it is well mixed 

 with small stones or gravel ; its favourite nesting-ground is on the shingly 

 beaches or reaches of gravel and rocks along the sea-shore, or on the edges 

 of some of our Scottish lochs. In the county of Moray great numbers of 

 Oyster-catchers breed on the gravelly reaches of the Spey and Findhorn, where 

 a summer spate often destroys many of their eggs. The bird sometimes selects 

 a nesting site on rocky stacks a long way above the water, and has been often 

 known to nest in fields ; one such instance came under my notice in Moray- 

 shire in 1893, when I found an Oyster-catcher's nest containing three eggs 

 in the middle of a rather stony grass field about three hundred yards from 

 the river Findhorn. Only one brood is reared in the year, though if the 

 eggs be taken, the pair will make another nest and lay a fresh clutch of eggs. 

 The male is the watchful guardian of his mate, on whom devolves the task 

 of incubation, and on the slightest alarm he gives warning to her, and she 

 immediately runs swiftly away from the nest, head down, and rises some 

 distance off to fly round and round the intruder, uttering her loud whistle, 

 'Keep-keep, kd-peep, kd-peek, peep! 



The nest, if it may be dignified with such a name, is merely a slight hollow 

 among the stones and gravel, lined with broken shells and small pebbles pressed 

 down smooth, and, as a general rule, many half-finished nests are found in the 

 vicinity of the one chosen for the reception of the eggs. On the sea-shore 

 the nest is often made among the dead seaweed and driftwood just above 

 high-water mark. 



The eggs laid vary in number from two to four, though three is the usual 



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