484 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
ORNITHOLOGICAL NOTES FROM EAST. NORFOLK. 
By J. H. Gurney, Jun., F.Z.S. 
In his ‘‘ Notes on the Food of Birds,” my friend Mr. Norgate, 
referring to the larder of the Red-backed Shrike, notices four 
species of bumble-bee which he has found impaled by this bird. 
To these I am able to add two more. We have this year been 
fortunate enough to have two pairs of Red-backed Shrikes at 
Northrepps, and each pair had two nests. I was very anxious to 
find their “larder” as soon as I heard of them, and the search 
has been carried on with great zeal. Fourteen bees were found, 
from the largest “ bumble” down to Bombus elegans. These were 
kindly identified for me by Mr. J. B. Bridgman, of Norwich, as 
B. subterraneus, B. leucorum, B. virginalis, B. elegans, B. hortorum, 
and B. lapidarius—all females. Mr. Bridgman does not think this 
shows any partiality in the Shrike for female bees, except that 
the females being heavier and slower flyers are consequently more 
easy to capture. It is worthy of remark that both Mr. Norgate’s 
specimens and mine were all identified as females. The bees 
were nearly all stuck upon dead thorns, such as are used to mend 
weak places in a hedge; whereas a Shrew-mouse and a young 
Yellowhammer were impaled on the wild plum or sloe-bush, and 
so firmly rammed down that the thorns projected through their 
bodies more than an inch. It is curious how little I can find on 
the subject of the Red-backed Shrike’s larder in our works on 
Ornithology. I had always supposed that when a spot had been 
chosen all the prey was impaled there. But this is not the 
case; the Shrike will garnish a hedge a quarter of a mile from its 
nest, and not be constant to the same spot for two days, as I have 
found in the case of the nests in this parish. 
On June 17th Mr. Norgate and I found a Greater Spotted 
Woodpecker’s nest, containing young, in a birch tree on the edge 
of a sheet of water known as Bluestone. The trunk of the tree, 
and of several neighbouring trees, was covered with scratches 
made by the claws of the Woodpeckers, for the most part parallel 
lines of various lengths, from two to four in number. I after- 
wards found several birch trees scratched and lined in the same 
way by the Green Woodpecker at Northrepps. The pond at 
Bluestone is a great asylum for the Reed Warbler, and as the reeds 
