The Zoologist— December, 18G6. 51-3 



(S. S. 456) as to its feeding on all sorts of grain, and also destroying 

 turnips by pecking holes in the bulbs, thus leaving them a prey to the 

 first frost ; it also feeds greedily on beans and peas. Here, where the 

 ring dove only occurs in moderate numbers, it is comparatively harm- 

 less, but in the eastern counties of Scotland it flocks to the fields in 

 prodigious numbers, and, as each bird devours quantities of the green 

 or ripe corn, the mischief done is beyond question. I totally disclaim 

 any piedudice in the matter; at least any predudice against the 

 defendant, for I have a strong feeling in favour of the persecuted 

 animals in general, but the above I k»ow to be facts. Whether the 

 measures proposed by the Kelso Association (S. S. 310) will have any 

 perceptible effects is very doubtful, for at least a portion of these huge 

 flocks are certainly foreign visitors, probably from Scandinavia. 



Woodcock.— \ flushed the first woodcock seen this autumn on the 

 9th of October : it rose at my feet within fifty yards of the house, and 

 flew with wearied and labouring flight. Jack snipe had been seen 

 about a week before. 



DimUn.—l have this summer ascertained that the dunlin breeds 



annually in this neighbourhood, though in but small numbers. They 



seem to be very local, frequenting two or three parts of a moor near 



the borders of Ayrshire, about twenty miles from the coast, and at an 



elevation of more than a thousand feet above the sea-level. Last year 



a very intelligent and observant shepherd first told me of these birds ; 



he called them " horse-cocks," a curious epithet, probably allied to 



« hoarse-gouk " or « horse-gawk," which Montagu gives as local names 



for the common snipe.* These dunlins leave this soon after the 



breeding-season is over. One shot on the 20th of June proved to be 



a male of last year: its gizzard contained remains of insects 



(principally small Coleoptera) and spiders, along with some small 



quartz-gravel. Is it not unusual for the dunlin to breed at such an 



altitude ? Dr. Saxby says that in Shetland, in the breeding-season, 



"it is not often that they occur very high above the sea-level" (Zool. 



9328). . , . , . 



Tufled Duck— On the 8th of October three birds ot this species, 

 the first ever seen here, appeared on a small pond. One was shot by 

 one of my brothers, and proved to be a female in good condition ; 



* Jamieson.in his ' Scottish Dictionary,' (jires "hoarsgouk" as an Orkney name 

 for the snipe, synonymous with the Swedish "hcrsgjok": he translates it "hoarse 

 cuckoo," but it may also mean, any "hoarse foolish bird." Perhaps the su.pe and 

 dunlin may have shared the dotterel's old reputation for folly.-^. R A. 



SECOND SERIES— VOL. I. ^ ^ 



