286 Wild Life in Wales 



with his own proper song, and continued doing so right 

 through the summer. A Great Tit, nesting near my 

 lodgings, constantly made use of the Coal Tit's common 

 call, almost to the exclusion of any other. 



30^. The first Cuckoo heard last evening; to-day they 

 are calling all over the hills : in 1 906, first heard on May 

 4th. 



May ^rd. One pair of Swifts flying over Carn Dochan : 

 a single pair in the village next day : they arrived in force 

 on nth, and at once set about visiting their nesting holes 

 in the cottage roofs, from which, in more cases than one, 

 they successfully ousted Sparrows, which revenged them- 

 selves by taking possession of Martins' nests as soon as 

 these were near enough completion to be habitable ! 



^th. Corncrakes calling everywhere at night, wherever 

 there is cover enough to hide them ; two or three were 

 heard for the first time yesterday. Curlews and Golden 

 Plovers both " scraping " on moors ; Ring Ouzel building ; 

 Water Ouzel hard sitting ; both Grey and Pied Wagtails 

 only building, three nests of the former, one in a crevice 

 low down in the wall of a cowhouse, adjoining a dwelling, 

 and well in the way of cats ! Another on top of a last 

 year's Dipper's nest ; Pied Wagtail's nest on the " wall- 

 head " inside the above-mentioned cowhouse. White Owl 

 with four fresh eggs in a hollow oak ; they were stolen by 

 some of the boys, later, and the bird laid again, and had 

 four half -grown young ones, on i2th August, in the same 

 tree, of which she was harried a day or two afterwards by a 

 man who told me he got five shillings each for them, and 

 " wished he could find some more " ! 



i $th. A large arrival of Yellow Wagtails, scattered 

 about, in pairs, all round the head of the lake. I saw one 

 below Bala on 8th, but there have been none here before : 

 next day they had all dispersed to their particular nesting 

 sites ; one seen building on i yth. Several newly arrived 

 Sedge Warblers also (first heard on 6th) and a pair of 

 Garden Warblers starting a nest. Long-tailed Tits fledged. 

 White butterflies (P. rap<z and napt) and Orange-tips (A. 

 cardamines) now appearing. Green Hair-Streaks (Theda 



