A HISTORY OF CORNWALL 



travelling along the border of the Arctic Ocean in the company of normal 

 migrants till they reach the north of Norway, turn southwards along the west 

 coast of Northern Europe. That these birds cross England with the great 

 migratory stream from the north-east is incredible, as such wanderers occur 

 much more frequently in Cornwall than in the counties over which such a route 

 would lie, and in which indeed most of the species have not been recorded at 

 all. Of the six examples of Bonaparte's gull recorded for the United King- 

 dom, three have occurred in the south of Cornwall ; of the three solitary 

 sandpipers so recorded, one was obtained at Scilly, and one at Marazion 

 Marsh ; of the nine Bartram's sandpipers, three have been shot at the Lizard ; 

 of the three yellowshanks, one was shot at Marazion ; of the two killdeer 

 plover, one occurred at Scilly ; of the four American stints, one was obtained 

 at Marazion and one at Penzance ; while the little green heron shot near 

 St. Austell in October, 1889, is the sole European representative of this 

 species from tropical and temperate America. It is remarkable that of 

 the forty-two indisputably Cornish examples of the American species, 

 thirty-one, including eighteen from Scilly, have been obtained to the 

 west of a line drawn from Godrevy lighthouse to St. Michael's Mount, 

 four from the Lizard, six from the immediate neighbourhood of Fal- 

 mouth, and only one, the little green heron already referred to, from 

 further east in the county. This suggests either that they have migrated 

 down the Channel and been driven back, or else that wandering round by 

 the north of Scotland they have come down the west coast, either through 

 the Irish Sea, or round by the west of Ireland, and so struck the westernmost 

 portion of the county. Some, no doubt, have come by the latter route, 

 but as only four out of the twenty-four American birds that have been 

 obtained on the Cornish mainland were captured on the north coast, and no 

 less than twenty on the south, one may conclude that the Channel route is 

 the usual one. 



Many flocks and irregular flights of birds come in from the north, both 

 at Hayle and at Scilly ; but there is little to indicate where they originated, 

 or by what route they have travelled, and migratory records at both stations 

 are still unfortunately meagre. During autumn and winter flocks of starlings, 

 larks, redwings, thrushes and various undetermined land birds have been 

 observed at Scilly coming in from the north-west, on two occasions against a 

 fairly stiff south-easterly breeze, so that it is more than likely birds cross over 

 from the south-east of Ireland to the west of the county, but to what extent 

 this is a genuine annual migration is at present uncertain. 



The routes or flight-lines adopted by our emigrant birds in autumn are 

 towards the south, the south-west, and the west. Occasional flocks are 

 reported by fishermen in the Channel as moving towards the south-east, and 

 the St. Ives fishermen at long intervals observe very large flocks moving 

 towards the north-west. There is, of course, a very considerable east-to-west 

 movement at times between the mainland and the Isles of Scilly, and in the 

 late autumn immense numbers of starlings, larks, redwings, fieldfares and 

 other birds pass over these isles, particularly at night, in a westerly direction 

 that if persisted in must carry them right into the Atlantic ! 



In spring the immigrants come in from the south-west, the south, and 

 the south-east. Coasting flocks are occasionally noticed on the south moving 



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