Strange Accidents to Wild Birds 



head and released it. To my astonishment it was back 

 again inside half an hour feeding away as merrily and 

 unconcernedly as if nothing whatever had happened. 



Flocks of birds misjudging their distance from a 

 moving object, the speed at which it is travelling, or 

 influenced by a strong wind, occasionally come to grief. 

 A friend of mine once witnessed a covey of partridges 

 collide with an express train in Lincolnshire, and after- 

 wards picked up eleven members of the family lying 

 dead by the four-foot way. 



A flock of starlings recently collided with a Welsh 

 railway engine. The impact was powerful enough to 

 apply the vacuum brakes and bring the whole train to 

 a standstill. The unique character of an accident of 

 this kind can only be fully realized by anyone familiar 

 with the wonderful wing power and acute mentality of 

 members of this species. 



Pathetic nest tragedies, in which both young and old 

 birds suffer, are by no means unfamiliar to the field 

 naturalist. Some years ago I came upon a hen chaffinch 

 hanged outside a bush wherein she had been in the act 

 of building a nest. She had gone to an adjoining farm- 

 yard to collect materials for the lining of her little home, 

 and had, unfortunately for her, found a long horse-hair 

 with a little clod of earth attached to one end of it. In 

 entering the bush the bit of mould had struck a twig 

 and made the horse-hair twirl round and round the 

 branch and the opposite end was entangled round the 

 luckless bird's neck in such a way as to form a running 

 noose. She hanged herself by her own efforts to escape. 



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