SPRING NOTES FROM NORTH LINCOLNSHIRE. 245 



wildfowl, have been drained. Still enough remains to make us 

 regret all that has vanished. I saw several Shovellers, chiefly 

 males, on the wing, sufficient to represent eight or nine pairs. 

 Snipe, Redshank, and Lapwings, also numerous Wild Duck and 

 Teal, the two latter with young broods on the " flashes." I also 

 flushed a pair of Dunlin from the heather, belonging to that 

 small, brightly-coloured race, some few of which haunt the banks 

 of the salt-water drains throughout the year. I had not the least 

 doubt, from the anxious manner of the little birds that they had 

 a nest not far off. I have received the eggs from this place, and 

 much rarer finds than even this, amongst the waders, have been 

 made in recent years. Formerly this common was a great resort 

 of the Short-eared Owl, several pair remaining to nest. The 

 Owls have been exterminated by the keepers with their deadly 

 pole-traps — a cruel form of bird-murder which no humane person 

 would tolerate or adopt. I question whether there are now more 

 than a pair or two nesting anywhere in the district. The useful 

 Barn Owl, too, has been ruthlessly destroyed whenever oppor- 

 tunity offered, in this same cruel fashion. Noiselessly across the 

 waste in the twilight, like a flitting phantom, comes the soft- 

 winged Owl, and seeing, as if placed ready to his use, a post of 

 vantage from which he may mark each stealthy movement of 

 the mischievous Field Vole, stays his flight to settle on the 

 treacherous perch ; and then during all that long, sad night, — 

 and too often, we fear, through the succeeding day, — with 

 splintered bone protruding through smashed flesh and torn 

 tendon, hangs suspended in supreme agony, gibbetted head 

 downwards, till death puts an end to his sufferings. Well may 

 we ask, Can all the game-preserving in the world justify this 

 ignorant and needless wrong ? A pair of Sheldrakes nested on 

 the common in 1887, and at this time eleven adults may be seen 

 on a large pond within a few miles, where they are carefully 

 protected. I found both Stock Doves and Wheatears, in some 

 numbers, using the old deserted, rabbit-burrows. Are these 

 invariably deserted by the rabbits ? From the foot-marks at the 

 entrance I suspect both bird and quadruped sometimes use the 

 same hole, or at least enter by the same door. A large colony 

 of Black-headed Gulls have now entirely removed from their old 

 pond, and gone to another further within the common ; eggs 

 were numerous, but I did not see any young : they now share 



