44 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



It cannot be said that the Garden Warbler is rare in the County, 

 and I can only account for its having apparently been often over- 

 looked, by the supposition that very few people can recognise its 

 song. Even in the immediate vicinity of Peebles several pairs can 

 be found annually, while in igii it was so common that its song 

 could be heard daily after 20th May within the Borough boundaries. 

 I first noticed it that year at Kingsmuirhall, and later the same 

 evening I heard another bird singing from among some thickly 

 planted young larch trees about 3 miles from Peebles on the 

 Cademuir road. Both these birds continued to sing throughout 

 the season. One which I sometimes heard at St Mary's Mount 

 may have been the Kingsmuirhall bird, as the two houses are quite 

 close and are within the Borough on the south side. 



On 2ist May one was singing in a tangled birch wood, called the 

 Quaw, about 4^ miles from Peebles, and practically in the Manor 

 Valley. I found a pair here each subsequent season up to and 

 including 19 14, after which my observations could not be continued. 

 The nesting site here was probably among wild rasps or possibly in 

 an adjoining cottage garden. 



I soon ceased to note every individual occurrence and I can 

 remember several in 1911 of which I have no written record viz. : — • 

 Among tangled privet near the head keeper's cottage at Haystoun, 

 in a dense wood of young spruce at Manorfoot and on the north 

 side of the Tweed at Jennets Brae, a wooded hill-face a mile east 

 of the town. 



The first nest I found was on 22nd June 19 13 in laurels or 

 rhododendrons at Stobo Manse. It contained young. The next 

 was at Jennets Brae when I was home on leave between 7th and 

 13th June 191 7. It was in a wild gooseberry bush and contained 

 four eggs, evidently almost hatching. 



Had I realised the paucity of records I could easily have found 

 nests almost any year prior to the war. To my mind the bird was 

 so common that I did not always bother to note it. 



The Blackcap is on a very different footing and I have only one 

 record of it. I saw a pair within 100 yards of the Garden Warbler's 

 nest at Jennets Brae in June 1917, and although I watched them 

 for a long time I did not find the nest. I think that it was in a 

 very thick young plantation adjoining the wood of old deciduous 

 trees among which the Garden Warblers were nesting. — G. G. 

 Blackwood, Dundee. 



