RING-DOVE. 165 



The coo of the ring-dove consists of five or six 

 distinct notes, the whole being repeated generally 

 three times, occasionally four or more ; but, what is 

 curious, it almost invariably stops with the first note 

 in the series. 



Feb. 6th, 1830. During the severe weather which 

 has prevailed of late, the field in front of my house, 

 which has the remains of a crop of cole-seed upon it, 

 has been visited daily by large flocks of ring-doves, 

 which subsist upon the leaves, and seemingly draw 

 their support entirely from this plant. 



A singular circumstance occurred to my nephew 

 one day last July (1845). As he was walking in the 

 fir-plantations at Bottisham Hall, a ring-dove fell 

 suddenly to the ground a short distance from him, 

 as if wounded. On going up to it and securing it, 

 he found it swarming with individuals of some 

 species of fly, which, by his description, I have no 

 doubt was a species of ornithomyia, and which ap- 

 pear to have collected upon the bird in such numbers 

 as quite to overpower it. It was a young bird of 

 the year, but fully fledged, and had not fallen from 

 any nest ; neither did it appear to have sustained 

 any injury in other ways. 



STOCK-DOVE.* 



WHITE mentions the stock-dove as being seen at 

 Selborne during the winter only, appearing in large 

 * Columba anas, Linn. 



