86 BIRDS OF SOMERSETSHIRE. 



The Editor says, in a note upon this, that he himself 

 never had ocular demonstration of any hird but the 

 Cuckoo actually eating the gooseberry grub. The 

 Redstart also feeds on worms, beetles and their 

 grubs, flies (which they frequently catch on the 

 wing, flying from the ground or a twig, like Fly- 

 catchers or Wagtails), spiders, ants and their eggs, 

 fruit and berries. 



The nest is generally to be found in a hole in 

 a wall or tree : it is made of moss, and lined with 

 hair and feathers. Like the Kobin this bird occa- 

 sionally chooses queer places for its nest. Stanley, 

 in his book on Birds, gives a picture of a Redstart's 

 nest behind the hinge of a door. 



The adult male Redstart has the beak black ; the 

 irides brown ; the throat, sides of the neck and 

 cheeks, including the eye and also a very narrow 

 streak over the beak, black; forehead white, a 

 streak of which extends back over the eye ; head, 

 neck, back, scapulars, lesser wing-coverts bluish 

 grey; tail-coverts orange-red ; greater wing -coverts 

 and all the quills dusky brown, very narrowly edged 

 with a lighter shade ; tail orange-red, slightly darker 

 than the tail-coverts, the two centre feathers dusky 

 brown, except the base and the edging of the outer 

 web, which are like the rest, the shafts of the 

 feathers are orange-red ; breast and belly the same, 

 inclining to dirty white towards the under tail- 

 coverts and on the flanks ; legs, toes and claws dark 



