BIRD-LIFE ON THE MOORS IN OCTOBER. 95 



below the general level of the surrounding " moss," and, on 

 these, direct approach on wildfowl is utterly out of the ques- 

 tion. Others, lying in shallow basins among the hills, with 

 the bare heather sloping right down to the water's edge, afford 

 hardly any greater advantage; though, in these latter, there is 

 usually a "syke," or broken gully, at the over-flow, sufficiently 

 deep to enable one to creep within reach of the water at that 

 point. These loughs usually have a firm bottom, either peat 

 or gravel, the latter here and there interspersed with beauti- 

 ful patches of silver sand ; but there is no shore where fowl 

 can sit dry, the water being deep right up to the steep banks. 



Wherever a section of the peat-formation is exposed, 

 trunks and remains of ancient oak, and other trees, are 

 visible, even up to 1,200ft. and upwards, the relics of a long 

 past age, when these now open, treeless moors were covered 

 with forest. These remains appear to be analogous to the 

 upright stems known as " sigillaria " in the coal seams of 

 the older carboniferous period. 



Years ago, before the celebrated wildfowl resort at Prest- 

 wick Carr, in Northumberland, was reclaimed, the geese 

 from the carr used regularly to resort to this and other 

 moorland loughs for a wide radius around to roost, and 

 many of the hill-farmers have anecdotes of incidents which 

 occurred when they went to lie in wait for the arrival of the 

 geese at nights. But now all that is changed. Corn grows 

 where only waste marsh and water formerly existed, and 

 except on a few such occasions as the above, I have never 

 seen the geese condescend to remain a single hour on the 

 moors. I need hardly say that the Brent, Goose never ap- 

 pears inland. It is, essentially, a salt-water fowl, and, on 

 the coast, more numerous than all the other kinds put to- 

 gether. 



By the middle of October the regular winter birds begin to 

 put in an appearance. Woodcocks, Grey Crows, Kedwings, and 

 Fieldfares arrive en masse about the 20th of the month. 

 The Woodcock, on arrival, pitch down among the heather, 

 often far out on the open moors, though never in any num- 

 bers. The earliest of these distinctly foreign birds which I 

 recollect finding thus, was on Oct. 2. 



