The Zoologist — January, 1871. 2439 



Coiumou Buzzard near Cauterbiiry. — Eiglit common buzzards have beeu 

 captured during the present month on the adjoining estates of Godmersham 

 and Chilhara Castle, near Canterbury. It is my opinion that a migration of 

 these birds has taken place.^ — Charles Gordon ; Museum, Dover, Xov. 24. 



Great (liray Shrike. — It is not often one can get near enough to the 

 great gray shrike [Lanius excuhitor) to observe the strange way in which it 

 strikes its prey. On a fine day in the early part of November, having three 

 linnets and a redpoll in cages, I put them out in the garden on the ground. 

 About ten in the morning I came out of the cottage to see if the birds were 

 all right, when I observed a strange-looking bird cutting some queer gambols 

 among my cages. At first sight I took it for a jay, but soon discovered it 

 was a specimen of the great gray shrike. I got within about eight yards of 

 him,- when he flew over the hedge with something in his beak. I waited a 

 little while to see if he would return, which he did in about ten minutes : 

 he immediately made up to a liunet's cage and began springing up about a 

 yard high and dropping again, with his claws distended, on the cage. This 

 performauce he repeated several times. I thought he meant no good to my 

 linnet, so drove him away, but he soon renewed his attack on another cage. 

 I was now within six yards of him, so I tried to take him with a net; but 

 he was not to be had, and flew over the hedge. But what did I behold ? 

 My poor redpoll hanging in the cage without his head. It was this that he 

 flew over the hedge with when I lirst observed him. In about two hours 

 after this he again returned and played the same antics as before. I again 

 tried to take him, but he was too wide awake, and flew up to return no 

 more. — H. J. Hardin rj ; 131, Lower Street, Deal. 



Pied Flycatcher in Somersetshire. — During the last summer I had from 

 the birdstuffer in Wells a good specimen of the pied flycatcher, shot in 

 the neighbourhood during the spring. — F. D. Power; Wells, Somerset, 

 November 14, 1870. 



Greater Tit preying on a Bat. — Early in the morning of the 13th of 

 November, 1870, I noticed a greater titmouse [Parus major) fly down from 

 the house-top with a living bat in his beak, and to our astonishment he set 

 to work pecking at it, evidently for the purpose of killmg it, which eventually 

 he did, the bat making only a weak resistance by gently flapping its wings. 

 The bird then flew away with its prey to a rose tree some ten yards off. 

 Revisiting the spot in two hours time, wc found that its little beak had 

 penetrated the bat's skull and cleared its brains out. — {Eev.} E. Charles 

 Moor; Great BeaUnij6, Wuodbridgc, Suffolk. 



Uawfinch at Great Bealiugs.— On the 19th of November, 1870, I shot 

 on an oak tree a splendid male hawfinch [Coccothraustes vulgaris), in winter 

 plumage. This bird is very uncommon in this locality. — Id. 



Rooks breeding in October. — A remarkable instance of the mildness of 

 the season is to be seen at the village of Birdenbury, Warwickshire, where 



