184 BIRDS OF MIDDLESEX. 



this time of year they may be found upon the coast 

 in flocks, and in their winter dress greatly resemble 

 Whirnbrel, from which birds, however, they may be 

 distinguished at a distance by their note, which 

 sounds like " lou-ey, lou-ey." 



The Bartailed Godwit has twice been observed 

 in this county in the spring ; on both occasions at 

 that famous resort of waders, Kingsbury Eeservoir. 

 In May, 1851, an adult bird was shot there, in full 

 summer plumage, and on the 29th April, 1863, four 

 others were seen at the same sheet of water. 



BUFF, Machetes pugnax. Female, Reeve. An 

 uncertain visitant, appearing occasionally during 

 the vernal and autumnal migrations in May and 

 August. On the 25th August, 1864, Mr. W. H. 

 Power saw three of these birds at Kingsbury Reser- 

 voir, and shot one of them, which proved to be an 

 old male. On the 21st May, 1866, during a high 

 wind from the east, five Ruffs passed over the head 

 of a friend* who was walking round this sheet of 

 water, and he shot one of them, a Reeve, in very 

 beautiful plumage. Previously to the above dates 

 several Ruffs had been killed in the county, and 

 since the formation of the reservoir at Kingsbury, in 

 1838, about a dozen examples of this bird have been 

 killed there. The curious frill which is peculiar to 

 the male bird, and from which he derives his name, 



* Mr. W. Swindell. 



