4 



NORTHERN BULLFINCH IN YORKSHIRE 



AN ADDITION TO THE BRITISH AVI-FAUNA. 



JOHN CORDEAUX, M.B.O.U., 



Great Cotes House, R.S.O., Lincoln; President of the Yorkshire Naturalists Union 



At a meeting of the Zoological Society held in London in November 

 this year, Colonel L. Howard Irby exhibited an example of this 

 large northern race {Pyrrhula major C. L. Brehm) which he got 

 from Mr. Philip Loten, of Easington. It was shot by Mr. Craggs 

 Clubley, near Kilnsea village, early in November 1894. Subsequently 

 I was fortunate to obtain a second very fine example from Mr. D. 

 Brown, of Filey, who informed me that it was also shot early in 

 November 1894, at Hunmanby. This second example was shown 

 by Colonel Irby at the same meeting, and it is very satisfactory to 

 learn that Lord Lilford has kindly undertaken to publish a likeness 

 in his beautiful ■ Illustrations of British Birds/ In the Hunmanby 

 bird the colours are very brilliant- — the lower parts a bright vermilion 

 toned with Chinese white ; upper parts a pure blue-grey ; beak very 

 strong and large ; tips of wing-coverts broadly pure white, and not 

 grey as in the English bird P. europcza, from which it differs also in 

 being considerably larger. This northern form is found in Scan- 

 dinavia, East Prussia, Poland, Russia, and all Northern Asia. It 

 has occurred more or less frequently in Heligoland in autumn during 

 a strong migration of eastern species. These two Yorkshire birds 

 exhibited by Col. Irby are the first recorded for Great Britain. 



December qth, 1 895. 



nd 



NOTE— MOSSES. 



New Yorkshire Moss and another Confirmation of Teesdale's c 



records — Dining a recent ramble over a portion of Teesdale's classic grou 

 I had the good fortune to find a tiny moss, Phascum rectum (Sm.) = Pottia recta, 

 previously recorded by him nearly, if not quite a century ago as an East Riding 

 moss, between Market Weigh ton and Beverlev, on the Wolds. Probably owing 

 to the lack of bryologicai workers it has not been seen again till November last. 



On the same day a m« 5 hitherto unknown to Yorkshire was brought to light, 

 viz. : Barbula brevirostns (Hook, and Grew ) ; this was found growing in a gravel-pit 

 ma valley of our Yorkshire Wolds between Market Weighton and Kjplingcotes on 

 the York and Hull line. The pit was opened out at the end of 1889 or beginning of 

 1890 to supply ballast for the new railway line between Market Weighton and 

 Driffield. The plant was associated with its congeners B. aloides (Koch) and 

 B. stellata (Schreb.) Schultz, but was not nearly so plentiful. All were found 

 growing on chalky clay spots of the debris of ihe pit. 



Mr, M, B. Slater imforms me that there are only two previous British records, 



one (1824) Parsons Green, Edinburgh, the oth r {1874) Ashwood Dale, Buxton ; 



there are also American and northern continental stations, but always scarce. It is 



somewhat singular that the appearance of this moss and that of the Seligeria 



reported last year, should be coincident with the disturbance and removal of soil 



and rock.— J. J. Marshall, Pharmaceutical Chemist, Market Weighton, 

 .Dec. 10th, 1895. 



