FLYCATCHERS 41 
white with a buff tint on the forebreast and flanks, and are 
conspicuously barred with semicircular black markings. 
Nest. Place: bushes, hedges, tangled growth of brambles, 
&c. Material: moss with stalks and other material, lined with 
rootlets, grasses, wool, hair, down. 
Eggs. Usually 5-6. Ground-colour may be white, cream, 
pink, brownish, or greenish, sometimes bluish, reddish, or bright 
green. Spotted or blotched usually at the larger end, with 
brown or reddish and fainter underlying lead tints, Av. size, 
*87 x ‘64 in. Laying begins in May. One brood. 
(17) Family: Muscicapide—Flycatchers 
78. Spotted-flycatcher [Muscicapa striata striata (Pallas) ; 
Muscicapa grisola Linneus|. Summer visitor, scarce in 
N. Scotland. Bird of passage (E. Clarke). 
Bird. Length 5 in. A small brown spotted bird that 
perches on the tops of fences, posts, and 
the like, from which it makes excursions 
into the air, flitting here and there on 
quick, graceful pointed wings in pursuit 
of flies, is almost sure to be the spotted 
flycatcher. The upper-parts mostly ash- 
brown with darker brown streaks on the 
head. Under-parts whitish with dark 
brown streaks. Gape provided with 
bristles. The young are conspicuously 
mottled whitish or buff on the upper- 
parts. 
Nest. Place: a large variety of situa- 
tions, such as beams, holes in walls, hay- 
stacks, &c., where the trunk and some ~ 
large branch of an old tree meet, rock Pic. 45 
ledges, deserted nests, creepers, spouts, &. on 
Material ; grass, rootlets, &c., lined with hair, wool, and other 
soft material. 
Eggs. Usually 4-5. Generally ‘“ Bluish-green at__ first, 
which often fades to yellowish-white, sometimes closely 
freckled with reddish-brown and at other times boldly 
blotched with chestnut and underlying purplish-brown” 
(Jourdain). Blue eggs occasional. Av. size, ‘72x54 in. 
Laying begins in late May or early June. Broods 1-2. 
79. Pied-flycatcher [Muscicapa atricapilla Linneus. By 
rule of strict priority should be Muscicapa hypoleuca hypoleuca 
(Pallas)]. Summer visitor to Great Britain, chiefly to N. Wales 
and N. England. Rare elsewhere. Bird of passage. 
