BIRDS OF THE HUMBER DISTRICT. 25 



circumstance in connexion with the Missel-Thrush 

 (Zoologist, 1871, p. 2639). In winter they congre- 

 gate for roosting, selecting some dense and thickly 

 wooded plantation, one of spruce preferred. I once 

 counted 135 Blackbirds enter a two- acre plantation 

 of young spruce in this parish, between 3.40 and 

 4.15 of a winter's afternoon ; seventy of these coming 

 in between 3.50 and 4 P.M. These 135 birds all 

 entered the cover at one corner alone, and probably 

 represented only one third of those using the place 

 for roosting an extraordinary number considering 

 the open treeless character of a large portion of this 

 parish, and one very far in excess of our resident 

 summer Blackbirds. Varieties occasionally occur, 

 more or less pied. 



I have never met with that anomaly, a purely white 

 Blackbird. In the ' Zoologist ' for 1872, p. 3020, 

 Mr. Boyes mentions one he procured in that winter 

 of a uniform dirty white, without a single dark feather. 

 He further remarks that not one in twenty of the 

 migratory Blackbirds in the autumn (that is, of 

 the males) has a yellow bill, although apparently 

 in adult plumage. I have observed the same thing, 

 and have always supposed them to be birds of the 

 year. 



38. TURDUS TORQUATUS, Linnaeus. Ring- Ouzel. 

 Occasionally met with during the spring and 

 autumn. I have seen it in the latter season in com- 



c 



