OTES 



MARKING BIRDS. 



We are very glad to be able to state that the scheme for 

 marking birds with aluminium rings, outlined in our last 

 number, has been well taken up, and we take this opportunity 

 of thanking those of our readers who are helping by putting 

 on the rings and filling up the schedules. We have so far 

 issued nearly 3000 rings of various sizes, and we hope soon 

 to publish some particulars of how they have been used, and 

 meanwhile, as there will still be many young birds about 

 during this month, we would ask those readers who have 

 opportunities for joining in the work to apply for rings and 

 schedules. Eds. 



REDSTART IN SUSSEX. 

 In reply to your correspondent (Mr. J. W. Bond) last month, 

 a Redstart (Ruticilla phcenicurus), some fifteen years ago, 

 built in my summer-house here (Netherfield, near Battle), 

 upon a sort of shelf which went round the top of the match- 

 boarded interior, under the heather thatching. I managed to 

 identify the bird, being very uncertain what the four eggs laid 

 were. Their colour was greenish blue, delicately sprinkled 

 with dull red, especially at the base, like a Whinchat's. The 

 bird deserted, and then nested in the cavity of a holly tree, 

 in a field close by, and laid four eggs speckled similarly. In 

 my twenty-one years' residence here I have never seen 

 another pair in Sussex. 



E. F. B. Monck. 



LESSER REDPOLL IN SUSSEX. 



Mr. Walpolb Bond writes in the last number of the Lesser 

 Redpoll as being a resident in Sussex. In the Tunbridge 

 Wells district I believe no birds stay throughout the year, for 

 those that nest here all seem to leave about September, and 

 then for some weeks there is scarcely one to be seen — or, it 

 would be better to say, heard. After an interval the winter 

 visitors arrive. The summer residents return at the beginning 

 of April, again after a gap of several weeks from the time 

 when the winter birds leave. This gap was particularly 

 noticeable last autumn, for only a very few birds came for 

 the winter and they were later than usual. 



H. G. Alexander. 



