8o THE BRITISH NATURE BOOK 



shyer, and disappears among the trees and brushwood. The eggs are a pure 

 olive-brown occasionally blue four to six in number, and are laid in May. 



Nuthatch. One of our residents, rare in the west but fairly common 

 in wooded districts elsewhere, this bird is readily identified by its shape : 

 stiffly built, thick, stumpy tail, powerful beak, and thick-set head. It feeds 

 on insects (all injurious species, weevils, and beetles), which it seeks for by 

 creeping up and down I sometimes think chiefly down trees, in the crevices 

 of the bark; but, as its name suggests, it is fond of nuts, which it wedges 

 into some crevice and then hammers and cracks. I have seen it take a dozen, 

 one after the other, in a few moments from my bird table. It also takes acorns, 

 beech nuts, and berries ; whilst in winter it comes for the cocoanut and fat 

 which I put out for the tits. It appears to pair for life, as I find both birds 

 together in the autumn and right through the winter. Its blue-grey back 

 and head (with a dark streak through the eye to the ear), reddish white throat 

 and chest, deepening into chestnut-red on the flanks, make it a handsome 

 bird. 



It has a musical note " Wheet-wheet " always the signal of its approach 

 in my garden, and a call-note " Be quick be quick " as it arrives on a post 

 outside my study window and. makes a headlong, very business-like descent 

 to the nearest food. The nest is usually in a hole in a tree (or a nesting box) ; 

 if too large, the orifice is plastered up with clay. The interior is furnished 

 with dry leaves or grass, and five to eight eggs are laid, white spotted with red. 



Petrel, Storm, the smallest web-footed bird known " Mother Carey's 

 Chicken" one of the four species of petrels that breed on our coasts. The 

 name " Petrel " is derived from " Peter," and is due to the habit of paddling 

 or treading on the water, characteristic of them all. The Storm Petrel 

 is seen off all our coasts, especially in spring and autumn, but it breeds only 

 in certain places namely, the islands. off the west coasts, from Scilly to the 

 Shetlands ; off the Irish coasts, and chiefly on the West Coast of Scotland. Here 

 its nest may be found on some rocky islet, under stones or boulders, in crevices, 

 or it may be in a rabbit burrow. It is generally a mere scrape, though some- 

 times a few grasses are used as a lining, or as a pad under the one chalky 

 white egg which is laid. Occasional eggs with a circle of reddish spots round 

 the bigger end are found. To its nesting site, even to the same burrow, the 

 bird will often return year by year. It is recognized by its small size (6| 

 inches), black plumage, with a patch of conspicuous white at the root of the 

 tail, long, black legs (their length no one has yet explained, as the bird does 

 not appear to walk on land, going straight from its nest to sea and back again), 

 webbed feet, black beak, and short tail. It appears to eat small molluscs and 

 other fish ; like the other petrels, it is fond of " sorrel." The young, which 

 are downy, are fed with regurgitated oil. 



The rare LEACH'S FORK-TAILED PETREL is much like this species, but is dis- 

 tinguished by its larger size and distinctly forked tail, as well as by the grey 

 on the wing coverts. It nests in very rare places in the St. Kilda group of 



