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Mr. P. F. M. Galloway,



Wrynecks, the 21st the Cuckoo was heard, and yesterday the 24th

I saw one Tree Pipit, which sat within six feet of me and looked

as though another twelve hours would end the poor bird’s

existence. On the 23rd, during the blizzard, I saw two Swallows,

these could scarcely fly and were only able with difficulty to clear

a low hedge; so starved and numbed with cold were they that it

is impossible for them to have lived through the night.


This season a very few migrants have arrived, but one

thing is certain, that few if any of the smaller migrants that have

arrived can be alive now. The Wryneck, whose food consists

solely of small insects, principally ants and their eggs, cannot

possibly have lived until to-day. The Swallow, which feeds en¬

tirely upon winged insects, must share the same fate. Even the

strong Green Woodpecker can with difficulty live through heavy

snow and frost, as its food supply, being ants, is entirely out of

its reach, and those birds of this species that do struggle

through severe weather are just those that are hatched and reared

in woods containing the large nests of the wood ant. These

nests are composed of nothing but small sticks and the needles

of fir trees, and into these nests the bird probes in winter until it

reaches the ants, which are often over two feet down from the

surface of the earth, and there in the winter may be seen holes

large enough for a rabbit to enter, where the Green Woodpecker

has reached the insects, which are to all intents and purposes

hibernating below the reach of frost; but the Wryneck only

devours the small black and the red ant, whose nest is com¬

posed of particles of earth brought to the surface by these in¬

sects, and these (although we are nearly into the merry month

of May, which by-the-bye, is only to be seen on a canvas in the

Art Galleries) cannot be had.


There is one species of summer migrant which may get

through this terrible weather, the Blackcap Warbler. Its food

consists largely of berries, as well as insects, and as its favourite

food, 011 its arrival in this country, is the ripe ivy berry, it may

share a better fate. There is a plentiful supply of these berries

and strange to say a plentiful supply of these beautiful song¬

sters, in fact they are more plentiful than any of our summer

visitors up to the present time. There is one thing I have always



