on the Nesting of the Whinchat.



27



earlier. For instance, in the last week of August last year I saw an

adult female and a young male pitch on the Shaldon Embankment

(near my house) and, after spending an hour in resting and feeding,

“ lift ” again, presumably to essay the adventurous feat of crossing

the Channel at its point of greatest width. We have no evidence

that the Whinchat sings at Christmas ; nevertheless I can testify to

the fact that the Blackcap, Chiffchaff and Willow-wren do so and we

know that young male Nightingales are trained vocalists when they

return to us in the spring, also that they are in full song when they

reach the Italian shores. I want someone, therefore, to explain to

me where they acquire that wonderful song unless it be in

Africa.


When, a couple of years since, I succeeded in breeding the

Stonechat (for an account of which see Bird Notes Yol. IX.), it

seemed a reasonable inference that something might be done with

the Whinchat. However, it does not do to jump to conclusions in

any matter connected with birds and several years’ study of this

species convinced me that it was not going to be so easy a task.

Whilst the Whinchat is sunning itself in Gambia, the Stonechat

may be seen apparently enjoying life amidst the bleak and weather¬

beaten “ tors ” of Dartmoor, fifteen hundred feet above sea-level.

The Stonechat may be easily kept in captivity even by a beginner

(an exhibitor who begged for one of my young Stonechats moulted it

several times in a cage without the least difficulty), but anyone who

can carry a Whinchat through a winter and through a spring moult

in high condition may justly consider himself an expert—in fact

there are many self-styled “ experts ” who could not perform such a

feat. There w r as also the question of rearing the young. Miss

Turner assured me that she saw a male Stonechat break up a lizard

and give it to its young piecemeal and my Stonechats fed their young

partly on grass-seeds but it seemed very unlikely, considering the

delicate digestion of adult Whinchats, that the young of the latter

would prosper on any similar diet. Still another consideration was

that, whereas I had been able to trap hen Stonechats myself, I

should have to depend on others for a supply of Whinchats ; so much

depends upon the treatment the hens of insectivorous species receive

during the first few days of captivity.



