Birds. 9497 



plovers in greater numbers than for many years past. The golden 

 plover is only a winter visitor in Sussex, and the time of its coming 

 uncertain. The first note that I have of them this winter is, "January 

 2nd, about thirty seen with some peewits;" but I remember having 

 seen a little bunch with the peewits once or twice in December. From 

 the 2nd to the 7th they continued to augment, and by the latter date 

 a hundred and fifty or two hundred might have been seen in a flock. 

 After this they disappeared, and T saw nothing of them until the 24th ; 

 from this to the 30th they were very plentiful, and I have been told 

 that in a district south of Chichester, called the Manhood, as many as 

 a thousand were seen together. 



Peewit. — Very few peewits with us now. I think most of these birds 

 cross the channel before the winter sets in. In November and the 

 early part of December there were some large flocks about in the open 

 fields ; but since then I have only seen now and then a small flock of 

 perhaps twenty to fifty birds. 



White Peewit. — A specimen nearly white was shot in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Petworth on the 24th. The head and neck are of the 

 usual colour ; some of the primaries white and others mottled ; the tail 

 the usual colour, excepting one feather, which is white ; and nearly 

 all the rest of the plumage is white. 



Dunlin. — January 30. Saw a large flock of dunlins in a field with 

 some golden plovers : this was nearly a mile away from the sea, and 

 about the time of high tide. 



Green/inch. — January 15. Saw an immense congregation of these 

 birds under some yew trees at Kingly Vale : the noise made by their 

 wings, as a lot of them flew up, first attracted my attention : they were 

 feeding on the seed of the yew. 



Linnet. — Only here and there a little party to be met with. They 

 appear to feel the efi'ect of the cold weather more ihan many of the 

 soft-billed birds. The gizzard of one examined was full of seeds, 

 I think principally small dock-seeds. The gizzards of two reed buntings 

 {Einberiza schceniclus) contained dock-seeds, but larger than those 

 found in the gizzard of the linnet. 



Fieldfare and Redwing. — Fieldfares and redwings have been very 

 tame lately, frequenting the lowlands ; they left them, however, as soon 

 as the hills were clear of snow again, and on the 31st scarcely a field- 

 fare was to be seen, and not many redwings. The redwing has, on 

 the whole, been rather more plentiful than usual this winter. The 

 gizzard of a fieldfare killed on the 28lh had two small brown cole- 

 opterous insects in it. 



VOL. XXIIl. Q 



