BIRDS OF PREY 235 



it is to-day doubtful whether the osprey may 

 still be retained in our list of British breeding 

 species. The kite, too, with the exception of 

 a very few in Wales, watched and guarded day 

 and night, is gone, and so also are practically 

 the harriers. 



Of those of our birds of prey still remaining 

 to us, the common buzzard is certainly deserving 

 of protection. Feeding chiefly on moles, mice, 

 voles, the smaller reptiles and insects, the good 

 service it renders may well be placed against a 

 very exceptional delinquency in the shape of 

 a young rabbit or hare. In quite as great a 

 measure is this the case with the kestrel, whose 

 graceful hovering flight as it pursues its con- 

 stant hunt for mice and voles forms so interesting 

 a note in our country landscape, yet to how 

 many of our keepers are these useful birds 

 merely 'hawks/ and therefore to be slain at 

 sight ? 



One would think that it would hardly be 

 necessary to put in a word of defence for our 

 owls, yet how often do these, too, hang in the 

 keeper's museum in pitiful if mute protest 

 against ignorance and incompetence ? For the 

 raven one would merely say that it were a pity 

 that so grand a bird should be exterminated, 

 but the hooded or carrion crow is a nuisance, 



