419 
EAST YORKSHIRE BIRD NOTES, 1907. 
E. W. WADE, M.B.O.U. 
Hull. 
The season of 1907 is one that will long be memorable 
amongst ornithologists for its consistently unfavourable weather. 
Commencing at Christmas 1906 with heavy snow storms and 
hard frost, we had a long and rigorous winter, followed by a cold, 
wet, and stormy spring and summer, with a few bright intervals only, 
conspicuous amongst which was the bright sunny weather during 
the second half of March. The effects upon bird life were dis- 
astrous. In winter, Redwings died by thousands all over the 
country, being driven by hunger to eat not only the Holly berries 
and Hips, but Mistletoe berries, which, as a rule, no bird but the 
Mistle Thrush will touch. The winter migrants were unusually 
plentiful in East Yorks., but the return migration was considerably 
delayed, even the hardiest species commencing their nesting duties 
much later than usual. Peewits, especially on the higher ground, 
could not face the frosts in March. Rooks were at least a week 
later than usual on the average in laying, and many nests were 
blown out of the trees by the March gales. Even the Heron, 
usually the earliest of nesting birds, which sometimes sits on its 
eggs through snow and frost, had, in one colony at least, not 
commenced to lay on 24th March. Carrion Crows in many 
instances were sitting on clutches of three incubated eggs on 
2oth April. Jackdaws, which usually have full clutches by the 
first week in May, had as many empty nests as full at that date ; 
whilst the spring migrants, warblers, &c., were conspicuous by 
their absence, and when they did come, were almost silent. 
Early clutches of Garden Warbler were abnormally small—three 
and four instead of the usual five eggs—and many of these birds 
were singing and laying in late summer, as if to make up for 
lost time. At the end of May, Tree Pipits were still in full song. 
Greenfinches and Brown Linnets had, as a rule, only just laid full 
clutches by the fourth week in May, and the latter continued their 
breeding operations till August, a clutch of fresh eggs being 
found at Hornsea on rst August; whilst Mr. F. Boyes (‘‘ Field,” 
4th September) reported that on rst September a pair was feeding 
a young Cuckoo in the nest. Mr. H. R. Jackson reports that in 
middle June he saw a Reed Warbler’s nest which, owing to the 
cold and stormy weather, had broken its supporting reeds and 
1907 December tf. 
