﻿30 Birds 



EEDWING. (PL XIII.) 



Turdus iliacus. 



The Kedwing, the smallest of the British thrushes, is a 

 common winter visitant to these islands, arriving during the latter 

 half of October, migrating at night, when its shrill call note may 

 often be heard as the birds pass overhead. Although this bird is 

 the most northerly in its range of all the thrushes, it is one of the 

 first birds to be affected by severe frost. Its nesting home is 

 Norway, Sweden, Iceland, and a little south of the Arctic Circle 

 generally, occasionally visiting Greenland and sometimes nesting 

 in the Earoes. 



The flight of this bird is rather rapid and at times undulating, 

 more resembling that of a skylark than of a thrush. 



Its food consists of worms, snails, and insects, especially 

 leather-jackets, larvae of the daddy-long-legs (Tipula), a very 

 destructive species which feeds upon the roots of various plants ; 

 these it destroys in large numbers during mild weather. In 

 the coldest weather, when frost and snow obtain, its chief diet 

 consists of the berries of the hawthorn. As the Eedwing is only 

 a winter visitor to Britain, when no cultivated fruit is obtainable, 

 it is absolutely harmless to both the fruiterer and the gardener, 

 and it is therefore entirely a beneficial bird. 



This useful bird may be readily distinguished from the Song 

 Thrush by the distinct whitish stripe over the eye and the 

 chestnut-red colouring of the flank feathers and under wing-coverts. 

 The sexes are almost similar in plumage, the female being some- 

 what duller in colour. 



HEDGE-SPAEEOW. 



Accentor modularis. 



The Hedge-Sparrow is abundant and generally distributed over 

 the whole of the British islands, excepting the more bleak and 

 exposed northern islands. This very familiar bird is resident, but 

 in the autumn a considerable migration from the Continent takes 

 place, when large numbers arrive on our eastern coasts. In spring 

 return flights occur. This bird is equally at home in gardens, 

 shrubberies, lanes, hedge-rows, copses and woods. 



