768 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE.—1912. 
I may say now that the wood is composed of oak trees, with coppice below, 
chiefly consisting of hazels, though there are many other trees and shrubs repre- 
sented, and these have grown to a considerable size in places that have not been 
regularly cut for many years. 
Among the common birds that build as a rule are the song-thrush, missel- 
thrush, blackbird, and hedge-sparrow, but there are often special points of 
interest concerning even them with regard, for instance, to the material of the 
nests, its position, and variations of the eggs. 
As a rule, too, from the beginning there have been each year a chiffchaff’s 
nest and several willow-warblers’, The garden-warbler and whitethroat always 
breed, and so does the lesser whitethroat, while the turtle dove builds every 
year. We have only once followed the development of the young cuckoo, though 
the eggs were found in the wood before it was protected. We have had on one 
occasion a wild duck’s nest, but the parent birds were most probably shot 
outside the confines of the wood. 
The long-tailed tit at one time was common, and it is almost the only bird 
that has not increased its numbers. The wren is numerous, and builds in the 
open or under cover in empty tins or old kettles which may or may not have been 
put up for the purpose. The robin is another bird which has the habit of making 
its nest sometimes in natural and sometimes in artificial surroundings. 
It is noticeable, however, that with the exception of an occasional pair of 
blue-tits, one of which nested in a hollow branch, none of the birds which 
commonly build in holes, except the two already mentioned, were found to nest. 
This, no doubt, was owing to the fact that the oak trees in the wood are young 
and sound. 
At the beginning of one season, however, my boy took it into his head to 
make some rough nesting-boxes with large openings, and that summer nests were 
recorded of the flycatcher, the great tit, and the tree-sparrow. Then other 
boxes were made with various-sized openings, and of more careful construction. 
These succeeded marvellously well. Blue-tits and coal-tits built, the tree- 
sparrows and great tits increased in number, and the wrens and robins made use 
of the boxes as well as of the tins and kettles. The nuthatch made its appear- 
ance, and has been a resident in the wood ever since. Experiments were also 
made in the way of open boxes for flycatchers, while trays for blackbirds and 
thrushes, which were fastened to the trees, found favour with some birds, in 
spite of the almost unlimited possibilities for their building in the undergrowth. 
Some of the visitors, whom we admitted sparingly in those days, asked us to 
make nesting boxes for them. The reputation of these dwellings spread, and 
as we were only too anxious to retain the services of our custodian we were glad 
to be able to keep him busy in the winter, and the profits on the boxes went 
towards the expenses of the wood. It soon became evident that improvements 
could be made in the nesting boxes. For gardens also it might be advisable 
to have something a little less artificial-looking. The only boxes on the market 
made from natural logs with which we were acquainted were those designed by 
Baron Berlepsch. 
To these we found several objections :— 
(1) First of all, they were manufactured in Germany. 
(2) The idea of making them harmonise with their surroundings was not 
carried through, because there was a piece of ordinary wood screwed on the top 
of the log. 
(3) The lid could not be lifted off at any time for the contents to be examined, 
and considerable trouble had to be spent in unscrewing it in order to clean out 
the boxes at the end of the season. 
(4) The inside, which was cut out very carefully to imitate the hole bored 
by a woodpecker, did not provide much room in the smaller-sized boxes for 
large broods, and all the trouble was thrown away in the case of all those which 
were fastened low down on the trees for the smaller birds. I therefore spent 
some amount of time and trouble, with the help of a member who has a joinery 
works, in producing boxes suited to our requirements, and these have been very 
successful. We made very rigorous tests last year, with which we were quite 
satisfied. 
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