A HISTORY OF SUSSEX 



198. Rock -Dove. Columba Hvia, J. F. 

 Gmelin. 



Evidently a very rare bird in its purely 

 wild state. Our cliffs being unsuited to its 

 habits it is not known to have bred within 

 the county. 



199. Turtle-Dove. Turtur communis, Selby. 

 A very common and increasing species. I 



doubt if there is any place in England where 

 this beautiful little dove is so common as in 

 the neighbourhood of Horsham. In the 

 summer of 1899, a friend from Scotland being 

 anxious to take a nest of this species, we 

 entered a small cover at Warnham for this 

 purpose, and in an hour had discovered seven- 

 teen nests. The same year I counted over 

 one hundred together in a small patch of buck- 

 wheat. 



200. Pallas's Sand-Grouse. Syrrhaptes para- 

 doxus (Pallas). 



This straggler from the Eastern steppes was 

 first observed and obtained in Sussex during 

 the invasion of these birds to England in 

 1863. In the second great arrival of these 

 birds in England and Scotland in 1888 they 

 were seen in the county as elsewhere in con- 

 siderable flocks, and many specimens were shot 

 along the coast. Some few even stayed 

 through the winter and were captured in 

 1889. The bird during this immigration is 

 recorded only to have nested in Scotland. 



201. Black Grouse. Tetrao tetrix, Linn. 

 Although stragglers still appear at intervals, 



blackgame as a resident and breeding species 

 may be said to have become extinct about 

 1845. Mr. Padwick of Horsham says that 

 about the year 1 840 his father shot as many 

 as six brace in a morning at Combe Bottom, 

 St. Leonards Forest. Though still seen and 

 killed annually about Leith Hill, Crowborough 

 and Hindhead near the Sussex border until 

 the year 1870, blackgame have since become 

 practically extinct, and I cannot ascertain that 

 any person has actually seen them since 1890. 

 Two attempts to reintroduce this fine bird 

 have met with no success. It is generally 

 the case that when indigenous and breeding 

 species are stamped out, new importations, 

 unless tried on a most extensive scale, are 

 failures. 



202. Pheasant. Phasianus cokhlcus, Linn. 

 Borrer, quoting from the Sussex Archaologi- 



cal Collections, tells us that the pheasant was 

 known in Sussex as early as 1245, for 'the 

 custos of the bishopric of Chichester was 

 ordered to send to the king for his use at 



Easter amongst other game twenty-four phea- 

 sants.' More covers are every year devoted 

 to pheasants, and certainly the sport of shoot- 

 ing them is not diminishing in favour. Sussex 

 is a ' pheasant ' county, though not so good as 

 either Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire or Nor- 

 folk. 



203. Partridge. Perdix cinerea, Latham. 

 Although partridges are well and generally 



distributed throughout the county Sussex can- 

 not properly be called a ' partridge county.' 

 Bags of fifty brace in a day are rare and only 

 made in an exceptionally good year. 



204. Red-legged Partridge. Caccabis rufa 

 (Linn.) 



Knox mentions that two coveys of these 

 birds were hatched and reared under domestic 

 hens and turned down at Kirdford near Pet- 

 worth in July, 1 84 1. Since that date they 

 have rapidly spread over the whole of the 

 Weald and certainly in west Sussex are an 

 increasing species. Formerly an open ground 

 loving species and by nature a dweller in the 

 fields and rough pastures, the red-legged par- 

 tridge will now readily take to and live almost 

 entirely in the woods when his safety de- 

 pends on it. 



205. Quail. Coturnix communis, Bonnaterre. 

 A scarce spring visitor, breeding occasionally 



on the South Downs and more rarely in the 

 Weald. 



206. Landrail. Crex pratensis, Bechstein. 



A regular summer visitor, breeding with us 

 and leaving in September. Occasionally a 

 straggler remains throughout the winter. 



207. Spotted Crake. Porzana maruetta 

 (Leach). 



A scarce summer visitor, its habits resem- 

 bling the last named species but showing an 

 especial taste for the edge of marshes. It has 

 also occurred in the winter. 



Little Crake. Porxana parva (Scopoli)_ 

 J. E. Harting has made known the 



208. 



Mr 



first instance of the occurrence of this rare 

 crake in Sussex. He found on reference to 

 an unpublished manuscript by Markwick, now 

 in the library of the Linnasan Society, that the 

 coloured figure and description therein attri- 

 buted to the spotted gallinule was in fact a 

 bird of this species. There are two good 

 specimens in the Borrer collection taken re- 

 spectively at Beeding chalk-pit near Shoreham, 

 October, 1855, and at Eastbourne in April, 

 1869. Five other examples taken within the 

 county are mentioned by Mr. Borrer. 



