FIELD NOTES FROM NORTH LINCOLNSHIRE. 243 



to and fro, their often repeated spring call-note resembling the 

 creak of a wheelbarrow ; this and the monotonous bell-note of 

 the Coots were the sounds which broke the stillness of this quiet 

 spot. The Coots were many, in pairs, sometimes chasing each 

 other with much noisy splashing. The males had the bills and 

 also the frontal plates a delicate pink — the colour of a " Captain 

 Christy" rose; and the Waterhens, dabbling along the reedy 

 margin, had the same parts like red sealing-wax. Two pairs of 

 Carrion Crows slyly watched the pond from the neighbouring 

 wood — a portent of much future ill to the domestic arrange- 

 ments of the waterfowl. This was quite a red-letter day for an 

 ornithologist, for on my return I saw a Ring Ouzel, and at a 

 sharp angle of our "beck" came upon fifteen little animated 

 lumps of sulphur — the first Yellow Wagtails of the season. They 

 were all males, and together within the space of a few yards, on 

 short green turf, searching as if for something to eat. I examined 

 them very carefully with a binocular, and found one which had 

 entirely a yellow head, the occiput only very slightly marked with 

 olive-green. Later in the afternoon I saw four females and a 

 male, also several Pied Wagtails — these latter in pairs. Perched 

 on a low bush in a meadow was the first Whinchat of the season, 

 and on a row of high trees, the nearest to the coast, a large flight 

 of Fieldfares, chattering and noisy, as if in consultation on their 

 forthcoming passage to Norwegian pine-woods. 



April 28th. — Several Redstarts in the hedgerows in the marsh ; 

 all are females, which is here invariably the case in the spring 

 migration ; the males appear to choose some other route. 



April 30th. — S., very warm. This morning the hedgerows 

 swarmed with Willow Wrens, all restless and on the move inland. 

 I do not remember ever having seen so many at one time before, 

 not even in the autumn at the Spurn, when they are moving south. 

 Numerous other small birds have come in during the night — 

 Lesser Whitethroat, Whinchats, Tree Pipits, and large numbers 

 of Swallows. Cuckoo first heard. In a field, where men were 

 ridging for potatoes, were many Yellow Wagtails, and with them 

 a single White Wagtail, Motacilla alba — a beautiful well-marked 

 male ; two, I have been informed, were obtained near Yarmouth 

 at the same date. I was much struck with the large influx of 

 small migrants seen this morning, and conjecture they had come 

 just in advance of the southerly gale, which, commencing on the 



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