ig8 THE WHEATEAR 



North Staffordshire Potteries ? where, too, the bird 

 seems to lay aside its shy and wary little manoeuvres. 



Mr. Wells Bladen, the well-known Staffordshire 

 ornithologist, reports on the Wheatear, which arrived 

 earlier than usual, telling us that he saw T one on a slag- 

 heap at Etruria on March 3rd. In April again he 

 witnessed the curious sight of five Wheatears, mobbing 

 a Kestrel on their slag-heap and driving off the intruder 

 quickly. In June there were at least a dozen of these 

 birds frequenting the heap, and one pair had nested 

 within twenty feet of a very busy railway siding. The 

 nest, with its lovely pale blue eggs, was in a hole in a 

 bank of fused clinkers, two feet from the ground. The 

 eggs were hatched safely, but the young birds were 

 unfortunately killed by some mischievous person before* 

 they were old enough to leave the nest. It was a pity 

 the bird made its nest so near the ground, for, as a rule 

 the great heaps which railway passengers between Stoke 

 and Crewe have seen and wondered at, by night as well 

 as by day, are little interfered with, or trespassed on. 

 The dreary slag-heaps in the neighbourhood of blast- 

 furnaces would appear to be spots equally unattractive 

 to man and beast, and especially so to that brightly 

 marked migrant the Wheatear, as it is known on the 

 sunny, wind-swept downs and sandhills near the sea. 

 In August again, one was seen on a railway waggon. 



Wheatears leave us by the beginning of October, but 

 now and again a few stray birds are said to winter here 

 in mild districts. 



The Wheatear has the crown, back of the head and 

 back a beautiful ashen-grey ; throat a faint buffish-white. 

 There is a black stripe from the bill to the eye, which 

 broadens out towards the ear. Underparts nearly white, 



