THE YELLOW BUNTING 



EMBERIZA CITRINELLA 



LOCAL names in surrounding counties : " Writing Lark " 

 (Essex, Surrey). 



STATUS IN BRITISH AVIFAUNA : A common and widely 

 distributed resident, its numbers perceptibly increased 

 in autumn. 



RADIAL DISTRIBUTION WITHIN FIFTEEN MILES OF ST. 

 PAUL'S : The Yellow Bunting cannot be classed with those 

 many species that are more or less familiar in the central 

 portions of the Metropolitan area. We must take prac- 

 tically the seven-mile radius before we can reasonably 

 expect to meet with this bird in even tolerable numbers, 

 and then it is certainly a local species, becoming increas- 

 ingly frequent as the outer ring of suburban London is 

 reached. Between the seven- and nine-mile radius I can 

 record the Yellow Bunting from the Wimbledon and 

 Richmond districts, from Twyford, Park Royal, and 

 Wembley, from Kingsbury, from Hendon, Barnet, and 

 Enfield, from Epping, Wanstead, Blackheath, Bromley, 

 and Morden. Beyond these limits it becomes scarcely 

 necessary to specify the districts, for the Yellow Bunting 

 becomes more and more widely distributed and general 

 in its occurrence. In winter this Bunting occasionally 

 mixes with flocks of House Sparrows about hay- and corn- 

 ricks, and I have often met with it in the hedges by the 

 wayside about Streatham and Dulwich. On the whole 

 it seems to be scarcer in the immediate southern suburbs 

 than the others. 



Showy plumage and a habit of perching conspicuously 

 on the tops of hedges and bushes render the Yellow 

 Bunting little likely to be overlooked. The song of the 

 male is one of the first to greet the ear in spring, and 

 his voice, commencing in February, is one of the most 

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