129 



THE SWIFT. 



Cypselus apiis (L.). 



This species entered the countrj along the whole of the 

 south coast, but chiefly to the west of Sussex. 



Early stragglers were seen in Hampshire on the 17th of 

 April, in Devonshire and Wiltshire on the 20th and 21st and 

 in Yorkshire on the 23rd. Immigration seems to have com- 

 menced with the arrival of some birds in the Scilly Isles 

 on the 25th, and from that date migrants in gradually in- 

 creasing numbers continued to come in daily on the western 

 half of the south coast up to the 7th of May ; these were 

 followed by a final influx on the 9th and 10th. To the 

 enst of Hampshire practically no Swifts arrived until the 

 6th of May. The few earlier arrivals in the south-eastern 

 counties seem to have travelled there from the west, while 

 most of the breeding-birds for that area, as well as for East 

 Anglia, apparently arrived during the last few days of the 

 main movement, on the 6th, 7th, 9th and 10th of May. 

 The progress of the main body through the western counties 

 was rapid, and stragglers soon appeared in most of the 

 northern comities and in Scotland, while considerable numbers 

 reached Yorkshire and Wales some days before there was 

 any increase in the east and south-east. 



After this migration it was clear that the greater part 

 of our Swifts had arrived, and they were reported as 

 nesting in Staffordshire on the 6th of May and in Surrey 

 on the 8th. Further small arrivals, however^ took place at 

 intervals in Kent, Sussex and Hampshire up to the 26th, 

 but their progress could be traced from the records, and it is 

 quite possible that they were merely supplementary residents 

 for the south-eastern counties. 



