THE SEDGE WARBLER 



ACROCEPHALUS PHRAGMITIS 



LOCAL names in surrounding counties : " Night Warbler " 

 (Essex). 



STATUS IN BRITISH AVIFAUNA : A common summer 

 visitor, widely distributed, and found in all suitable 

 localities. 



RADIAL DISTRIBUTION WITHIN FIFTEEN MILES OF ST. 

 PAUL'S : The Sedge Warbler is certainly more generally 

 dispersed and commoner than the Reed Warbler in the 

 Metropolitan area. To begin with, it is far less fastidious 

 in the selection of a haunt, and often makes its summer 

 retreat on the banks of small ponds and ditches, which 

 the rarer species would shun. I have records of its breed- 

 ing at Dulwich, Wimbledon, Kew, and Richmond ; it 

 is found in many localities within our radius in North 

 Surrey and Kent ; whilst in Middlesex it may be met 

 with in most suitable spots about the Brent, the canal 

 banks at Twyford, Park Royal, Wembley, Harrow, 

 Kingsbury, the northern suburbs, and east to Epping, 

 Wanstead, Ilford, and Dagenham. The Sedge Warbler 

 is much attached to its haunts, and will continue to visit 

 them after much of their once great privacy has been 

 disturbed by the growing exodus of London's population. 

 On several occasions I have remarked how the noisy 

 rowing of some Cockney band on river or canal has called 

 this Warbler into scolding songs of resentment. It is a 

 skulking bird, and very often overlooked in localities where 

 its presence might never be suspected. 



Such Sedge Warblers as spend the summer within 

 the area of Greater London reach their usual haunts 

 towards the end of April, and, like the preceding species, 

 leave them again in September. Although not quite so 

 exclusively aquatic, this bird somewhat closely resembles 



