75 

 FIELD NOTES. 



BIRDS. 



'Wild Qeese,' or 'Gabriel's Hounds' {Nat., January, 

 1918, p. 24). — I saw a flock flying over Rollerton near here about 

 the date mentioned, viz., November 28th, 1917, and also heard 

 the ' cart wheel ' sound of their cry, which in South Yorkshire 

 foretells a funeral. My elder brother, who spent all his leisure 

 winter time in wild-fowling off Spurn or on The Wash, always 

 said they went across to the west and vice versa according to 

 their natural intuition where their food was most plentiful. — 

 Albert Ernest Hall, Southwell, Notts. 



Separation of the Sexes of the Chaffinch in Winter. — 

 There is much conflict of opinion among naturalists as to 

 whether there is any marked segregation in the sexes of the 

 Chaffinch in Britain in winter. If, as Mr. Hudson says in his 

 ' British Birds,' no separation takes place in the South and 

 West of England, it is somewhat curious that White should 

 so frequently refer to this separation in his district, where 

 this species is abundant in winter, the flocks, however, he says, 

 seemed to be almost all females. In this district ( Wilsden) even 

 in very mild winters we seldom see many female Chaffinches 

 from end of November to February ; they are nearly all 

 males. One came to my garden window to be fed all last 

 winter, but it had one leg much injured, and I saw another 

 feeding yesterday (7th inst.) in the main street in Bingley. 

 In northern Europe this separation of sexes is quite marked, 

 mostly males are met with in this region, the females pre- 

 sumably wintering in a lower latitude.* — E. P. Butterfield, 

 Wilsden, January 8th, 1918. 



Long= Eared Owl Nesting on the Ground. — A pair of 

 Long-Eared Owls built their nest on the ground at Bell Hole, 

 near Hebden Bridge, in the summer of 1917, hatching two 

 young, which, however, mysteriously disappeared. There 

 seems to be an increasing tendency of this species to depart 

 from its normal habit of nesting in trees. It was not my 

 privilege to see either the birds or nest, and as the place 

 seemed more suitable ground for the Short-Eared Owl than 

 for the Long-Eared, it seemed natural to expect that the nest 

 belonged to the former. Some feathers from within or around 

 the nest, which were put into my possession, proved the sur- 

 mise to be incorrect, as they were determined by Mr. T. A. 

 Coward, F.Z.S., Bowden, Cheshire, who kindly compared 

 them with others at the Manchester Museum, as belonging to the 

 Long-Eared Owl. This is the first known case of the species 

 nesting on the ground in this district. Mr. Coward adds that 



* The separation of sexes is very marked in this district, where we see 

 flocks both of male and female. Quite a number of males have frequented 

 the vicinity of my house this winter. — R.F. 



1918 Feb. 1 . 



