232 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



predominating. A Common Buzzard was procured in the neighbourhood 

 of Ryde in December. Starlings were first observed about the roofs and 

 chimneys in the town early in March, and Blackbirds were found to be 

 nesting early in the same month, when its song was first heard. Young 

 Thrushes were on the wing by the middle of April. The Ohiffchaff was 

 unusually late in arriving, none having been heard of till the beginning of 

 April, nor did I see one till the 14th of the month. Though 1 am told that 

 the Nightingale was heard towards the end of March at St. Lawrence, its 

 song was not again heard till April 14th, a mild day, therm. 52° at 10 a.m. 

 Swallows were rather late in arriving, none having been observed till the 

 14th April ; they seldom remain on the coast on their arrival, as I have 

 had occasion to point out in former notes. On the 20th April I did not 

 observe one between Ventnor and Ryde, though the meadows on the Yar 

 abound with them later on in the season. Rooks had returned to their 

 nesting trees in the village of Bonchurch by the first week in March. — 

 Henry Hadfield (Ventnor, Isle of Wight). 



Breeding of the Shout-eared Owl in Suffolk. — One if not two 

 pairs of the Short-eared Owl, Asia accipitrinus, have bred this season in 

 Tuddenham Fen. In the fourth edition of Yarrell's ' British Birds,' the 

 year 1804 is stated to be the latest known to the Editor in which this bird 

 nested in the Eastern Counties : and nothing is there said of this bird's habit 

 of placing its young, soon after they are hatched, one here and one there 

 within a radius of about twenty yards of the original nest. By the side of 

 one of the young ones so placed in Tuddenham Fen was a full Snipe. — 

 W. T. Angove (Mildenhall, Suffolk). 



[Our correspondent appears to have overlooked the fact that the third 

 part of the fourth edition of Yarrell's ' British Birds,' which contains the 

 account of the Short-eared Owl to which be refers, was published ten years 

 ago — February, 1872. Since then this bird has been reported to have 

 nested again in the Eastern Counties. For instance, Mr. Christy last year 

 reported a nest in Wicken Fen, Cambridgeshire (see Zool. 1881, p. 336), 

 and Messrs. Clarke and Roebuck, in their lately published ' Handbook of 

 Yorkshire Vertebrata,' refer (p. 41) to the occasional nesting of this Owl in 

 their county. — Ed.] 



Teal and Redshank breeding in Yorkshire. — Allow me to record 

 the finding of e eggs of the Teal on Strensall Common, on Easter 

 Monday, which is exactly a year since I recorded the last taken there. The 

 nest contained nine eggs, and, unlike that previously recorded, was in the 

 immediate vicinity of water. The nest was visited twice, and each time the 

 bird allowed a near approach before quitting the eggs. A friend of mine 

 also purchased in a poulterer's shop here four eggs of the Redshank, taken 

 in the vicinity of Melbourne, near York. On Easter Monday I procured 



