284 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



north of the county at the end of the month ; on the 30th, two 

 flocks winging their way to roost in the Aynhoe Woods must 

 have numbered two hundred each. 



February. — A very dark-coloured male specimen of the 

 Common Buzzard was trapped at Horton on the 5th. A male 

 Bittern was shot at Merton on the 8th. A Waxwing was seen by 

 Mr. W. Wyatt on the outskirts of Banbury on the 13th ; he was 

 able to get pretty close to it, and watched it for some time ; Mr. 

 Wyatt is well acquainted with the bird, having preserved two or 

 three specimens. A specimen of that unusual visitor to Oxford- 

 shire, the Dipper (now in F. C. A.'s collection), was shot by a 

 small stream in the northern extremity of the county, near Farn- 

 borough, on the 20th. A pied variety of the Jackdaw was shot 

 near Oxford this month. On the 9th, in a flock of about seventy 

 Ring Doves near Oxford, M. saw one apparently nearly pure 

 white. Throughout January and February Bramblings were 

 unusually numerous about Oxford ; a very richly-coloured speci-- 

 men was shot there at the end of the latter month, which had 

 almost assumed its full spring dress ; another had its flanks of a 

 reddish orange ; the earliest we heard of was shot in the north of 

 the county on January lUth; about the end of February a boy 

 took forty in his bat-fowling nets near Wroxton. 



March. — The weather was excessively severe during the first 

 half of the month, and all the Thrushes suff"ered greatly, but none 

 so much as the Fieldfares ; numbers of these were caught by the 

 hand— too weak to fly. The supply of haws being exhausted, 

 and the few remaining being in a dry and shrivelled condition, 

 the birds had great difiiculty in obtaining food ; one shot on the 

 6th had been feeding upon half-rotten swedes in the sheep-pens, 

 and the whole bird, the intestines especially, was thoroughly 

 impregnated with the smell. During the summer, when looking 

 for nests, it was quite a common occurrence to find the remains of 

 a Fieldfare in the middle of the hedge. About 150 Bramblings 

 were killed at three shots near Balscot in the first days of 

 the month. Three birds received by A. from that place, shot on 

 the third, had lost nearly all the brown feather-edges of winter; 

 one had a black chin ; two more were shot at Wroxton on the 4th. 

 Mr. W. W. Fowler informs us that four Curlews were seen close 

 to the village of Kingham about the 12th of the month. One 

 Hooded Crow was seen by M. feeding with some Rooks in 



