PLATE I 

 CRESTED TIT. Parus cristatus 



May 26//r, 1896. This Plate was chosen from four photographs which I 

 took of Crested Tits' nests in Rothiemurchus Forest, as it was the most 

 typical site selected. Every here and there in these great pine woods there 

 are tracts where the trees have died down to a great extent, and there are 

 innumerable dead trunks, from four to five feet high, standing among the 

 living trees. In these dead stumps the Crested Tits love to make their 

 nests, and wherever there is a hole started, either naturally or otherwise, 

 they soon work a deep enough hollow to hold the nest. I went about tapping 

 these stumps with my stick, and soon located five nests ; all of them contained 

 nearly fully- fledged young ones. The one I found first is the one illustrated 

 in the Plate. The nest was about seven or eight inches from the mouth of 

 the hole, and was made entirely of deer's hair and a little moss. It contained 

 seven fully-fledged young ones carefully packed into the nest-chamber, with 

 all their heads sticking up clamouring for food. The old birds were in a 

 fearful state of anxiety when I approached the nest, and fluttered about 

 within three or four feet of me, with erected crests, scolding vigorously, and 

 continually uttering their spluttering cry, ' fnr-ur-rc-re-ree.' I photographed 

 the nest-hole before I approached the tree, as I did not want to disturb the 

 heather and grass in the foreground or to touch the orifice ; but after I had 

 secured the picture I tried to see into the nest, and some of the rotten wood 

 broke away at the mouth of the hole. Instantly the whole seven young 

 birds poured out and fluttered away over the heather in all directions, 

 followed by their anxious parents, who raised a most dreadful hubbub. 



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