114 



SOME HABITS OF THE SPARROW-HAWK.* 



BY 



J. H. OWEN. 



(7) The Effects of Sunshine. 



The watching of the Sparrow-Hawk in wet and rough weather 

 is delightful and fairly easy, especiaUy during the nesting 

 season. The study of the bird in bright sunshine is equally 

 entrancing, but a great deal more difficult. All notes obtained 

 outside the nesting season are, more or less, matters of luck. 

 During the nesting season observations may sometimes be 

 made by cutting away branches round the nest so as to let 

 the sun in on the nest during the most suitable hours. Here 

 again, however, it is necessary that the sunshine shall fall on 

 the nest without touching the front of the hut. Otherwise, 

 the building of the hut will be a much more complicated 

 business if it is to be thoroughly successful. Apart from the 

 nesting season many of the bird's actions are influenced 

 by sunshine. For example, sunshine is almost a necessity 

 for preening. For adults there seems to be a normal time 

 for certain operations, such as preening, bathing, hunting, 

 flying and building : sun and wind have great effect on these 

 operations, not only as to their duration and completeness, 

 but even as to their actually taking place at all. My notes 

 on most of these points outside May ist-August ist are neces- 

 sarily scanty, but I will give my conclusions, and perhaps 

 those who have been lucky enough to have made further 

 observations will add to them. 



The Sparrow-Hawk is a clean bird and bathes fairly regu- 

 larly, but it is a matter of great good fortune to be able to 

 watch one at work in a perfectly wild state. My friend, 

 and sometime pupil, Mr. F. N. Stocker, was lucky enough 

 to do so on several occasions during August 1916. On each 

 occasion he was hiding in a hut to kill Wood-Pigeons coming 

 to grain. There was a copse with a late brood of young 

 Hawks adjoining one side of the field, and by luck his hut j 

 commanded a view of a piece of ground on the edge of a stream. 

 Daily, if the sun was strong, the Hawks came and bathed on 

 the edge of the gravel at mid-day. Their motions were the 

 same as those of other birds, but the most enjoyable move- * 

 ment was the throwing of water over the back and the twist ' 

 of the head over the shoulders to wash the feathers and wipe 

 the moisture off. The bathing would last several minutes, 



* For previous articles on this subject see Brit. Birds, X., pp. 2, 26, 

 50, 74, 106 ; XII., pp. 61, 74. 



