214 BIRDS OF THE WEST OP SCOTLAND. 



the Wood Pigeon has followed the introduction of the clovers and 

 turnip, and the extension of fir plantation, and all parties look 

 upon these birds as the greatest curse to agriculture." It is re- 

 markable that, after a lapse of twenty years, during which interval 

 active measures have been used to keep down its numbers, this 

 bird should still be regarded as a rapidly-increasing pest, and an 

 agricultural scourge of such magnitude as to baffle all attempts to 

 bring about even a partial remedy. As a proof of the enormous 

 flocks still to be found in East Lothian, which occupies but a 

 limited area compared with other Scottish counties, I here give 

 the particulars of the numbers killed during the last eight years, 

 under the auspices of the United East Lothian Agricultural Society, 

 which have been obligingly furnished to me by the Society's 

 secretaries : 



Year 1863, (including December, 1862,) - 13,450 



1864, 15,289 



1865, 29,141 



1866, 17,227 



1867, 10,461 



1868, 16,760 



1869, 17,324 



1870, (till 6th June only) - 10,788 



Total, - 130,440 



Notwithstanding this extraordinary slaughter, which is almost 

 without a parallel in the history of British birds, no perceptible 

 diminution of the nuisance has yet taken place a fact which 

 begets a suspicion, to say the least of it, that East Lothian is 

 yearly invaded by large numbers of these birds, which have been 

 reared in other countries; and that so long as the migratory flocks 

 continue to arrive, no amount of persecution, however well timed, 

 can be expected to root out the evil. The Wood Pigeon in Scot- 

 land is well known to be of sedentary habits, encouraged no doubt 

 by the abundance of the food it finds, especially in a purely agricul- 

 tural county like Haddingtonshire ; hence the winter visitants from 

 the pine forests of Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and some parts of 

 Russia where the bird is known to migrate, do not return, like the 

 redwings and fieldfares, on the approach of summer, but remain, 

 perfectly satisfied with their new quarters, and thus fill the place 



