C4RASSHOPPER WARBLER SEDGE WARBLER. 89 



THE GRASSHOPPER WARBLER. 



SALIC ART A LOG U STELLA. 



THIS very curious bird is apparently more local in its distribution, 

 with the exception, perhaps, of the lesser whitethroat, than any 

 of the other Scottish warblers. It has been traced from the 

 Solway Firth to the Firth of Forth on the east side as a regular 

 visitor, and from Wigtownshire to Loch Lomond on the west. It 

 is also found in some of the midland counties, but I have not been 

 able to trace the migration of the species to a more northern limit 

 than Bonaw, near Oban, Argyleshire. In the Loch Lomond dis- 

 trict, it is not uncommon above Tarbet, in a plantation of young 

 larch trees, at an elevation of five or six hundred feet above the 

 level of the loch. The bird is very restless, and is generally heard 

 at nightfall in this plantation, where it at once betrays itself by 

 its peculiar note, which it utters almost without intermission until 

 daybreak. By taking up a favourable position, the observer may 

 usually see the birds come to the outer twigs of a thick bush and 

 wheel round and round, shivering their wings, and making the 

 still air ring with their strangely monotonous concert. I have 

 frequently found young broods dispersed when but half-fledged, 

 from which circumstance I have thought that they quit the nest 

 much earlier than most birds. On such occasions my search for 

 the young warblers was very perplexing, their chirpings coming 

 from all sides with a most bewildering effect. 



Mr Oliver Eaton, Kilmarnock, has informed me that this bird 

 has appeared regularly early in May in all the plantations near 

 that town for the last twenty years. 



THE SEDGE WARBLER. 



SALICARIA PHRAGMITIS. 



THE Sedge Warbler is a very common species in many parts of 

 Scotland, but especially abundant in the western counties extend- 

 ing from the south of Wigtown to the north of Argyle. It is by 

 no means uncommon even in western Inverness and Sutherland. 

 In numbers it appears to rank next to the willow warbler, which 

 enlivens almost every county with its well-known and cheerful 

 song; and throughout the short summer nights, when all other 



