The nest ... is constructed of dry grass, rootlets and moss." 



THE YELLOW HAMMER 



T 



HE Yellow Hammer, or 

 Yellow Bunting as it is 

 otherwise known, is com- 

 mon in nearly every part of 

 the country where culti- 

 vated fields separated by 

 hedgerows and interspersed 

 by furze-clad commons and 

 bramble-grown pieces of waste land are 

 to be found. The male is rather larger 

 than the female, but this is not such a 

 noticeable sexual difference as the colora- 

 tion of the plumage affords. He has 

 more yellow and less brown on his body 

 than his mate. If it be remembered 

 that in neither sex of this species is 

 there any black or brown under the 

 chin, the chance of confusing the 

 Yellow Hammer with its much rarer 

 relative the Cirl Bunting will be well- 

 nigh impossible. 



Although the song of the male con- 

 sists only of a few notes repeated 

 with a persistence some people consider 



wearisome, it has its virtues. It is 

 uttered early in the spring when almost 

 any bird voice is welcome, is not very 

 loud, and is, therefore, lost in the fine 

 chorus of May and June, and heard again 

 when all other feathered vocalists are 

 silent towards the close of summer. 

 Whilst preparing the present article at 

 the end of July I have been making 

 observations in a sheltered dell where 

 throughout May the early morning air 

 palpitates with the songs of thrushes, 

 blackbirds, skylarks, chaffinches, robins, 

 nightingales, tree pipits and wrens, and 

 noticed that e"very voice was hushed, 

 saving that of the Yellow Hammer. All 

 alone in his vocal glory he was telling his 

 sitting mate the old, old story, tic-tic-tic-e- 

 ereze. 



The food of the Yellow Bunting con- 

 sists of grain and the seeds of all kinds 

 of weeds in the winter, and insects 

 throughout the summer. It is a late 

 breeder, and I have never found its eggs 



