'The male helps the female to feed the young ones." 



THE STONECHAT 



T 



HE Stonechat is an inhabitant 

 of rough commons and 

 waste lands, where furze, 

 heather, and brambles grow 

 in tangled profusion. The 

 male is a strikingly hand- 

 some bird. His sharply 

 contrasted colours of black, 

 white, and rusty brown, added to his 

 fondness for perching on the topmost 

 spray of any and every bush that comes 

 in his way, make it well-nigh impossible 

 to pass him by unseen. Restlessness 

 seems to be one of his most pronounced 

 characteristics, for he is always busy 

 flying from one bush to another, or 

 dropping from his elevated look-out to 

 the ground in pursuit of some insect 

 which his sharp little eye has detected 

 below. 



Although not a very accomplished 



vocalist when compared with the Night- 

 ingale or the Blackcap, his excited 

 antics whilst delivering his short, sweet 

 notes on the wing are sometimes very 

 amusing. My friend Mr. Ussher has 

 very aptly described them, in his " Birds 

 of Ireland," as like a ball rising and 

 falling on the jet of a fountain. 



The female differs considerably in 

 appearance from her strikingly attired 

 mate, but in spite of this fact one feels 

 that her sober brown plumage is entirely 

 in harmony with her natural surround- 

 ings. 



The spring call-notes of the Stonechat 

 may be imitated with ease and exact- 

 ness by tapping two pebbles together, 

 but, curiously enough, after the young 

 ones have been hatched they change 

 in sound from u-tic, u-tic to notes 

 resembling chuck, chuck. 



