The Zoologist — Septembek, 1871. 2745 



disappear as the country becomes cultivated, and may be seeeu almost 

 anywhere, more abundantly perhaps near cultivated ground than on the 

 moors or barren heaths, carefully quartering the ground in search of prey, 

 now hovering in the air and scrutinizing a particular spot, now sailing at a 

 great altitude above the ground, and every now and then pouncing down on 

 its prey, which if it fails to secure, it recommences its search with unwearied 

 assiduity. Its food consists chiefly of field-mice, large insects, which it 

 seizes and devours on the wing, grasshoppers, frogs, young or small birds ; 

 and it rarely, if ever, attacks anything larger than a lark. Mr. J. H. 

 Gurney, jun., informs us that a kestrel was once seen engaged in eating a 

 hooded crow, the largest game we have ever heard of this bird devouring. 

 It does not, so far as we can ascertain (except on rare occasions), ever prey 

 on young partridges, though Mr. Stevenson, in his ' Birds of Norfolk,' 

 states : — ' That some kestrels carry off young partridges as well as other 

 small birds during the nesting-season is too well authenticated as a fact for 

 even their warmest advocates to gainsay ; yet still the amount of good 

 which the species generally effects throughout the year by destroying large 

 quantities of mice, moles, insects and worms, should entitle it rather to 

 protection at the hands of the farmer than annihilation for occasional raids 

 upon the keeper's preserves.' On the other hand, Naumann says, ' It 

 seldom gets hold of young partridges, as the watchful mother protects them 

 at the risk of her own life.' There is no doubt strict truth in the statements 

 of both the above-mentioned ornithologists ; but we think that the capture 

 of young game by the kestrel is only occasional, and that the bird only does 

 this when other food is scarce, or, more probably, when hard driven to find 

 food for its own young; for it will be remembered that at the time the 

 kestrel breeds there must be a less quantity of mice to be captured, on 

 account of the long grass and corn. It is generally in the stubble-fields 

 that the kestrel finds an abundance of food ; and the bird may often be 

 seen in the twilight, standing out in bold relief against the sky, as it hovers 

 in the fields of sheaved com, from which the harvest-men have just retired. 

 The kestrel is more active in the early morning and at dusk than in the 

 daytime. During the heat of the day it is not much seen, but keeps to the 

 thick woods, sometimes soaring above them and wheeling in circles. 

 Occasionally four or five may be thus observed at once in the large woods. 

 " Ancient ruins near cultivated places, or, in the wilder countries, rocky 

 localities, are the favourite haunts of the kestrel. In large towns, where old 

 churches or cathedrals are found, there also these falcons congregate, and 

 breed in large numbers in the belfries and towers ; in countries where the 

 lesser kestrel is found, the two species frequent the same localities. It nests 

 in holes of ruins and in church-towers, or under the eaves of old buildings, 

 in holes and clefts of rocks, and in hollow trees, sometimes also in deserted 

 nests of the crow or magpie. In England it more frequently chooses the 



