FALCO TINNUNCULUS, Linn. 



(The Kestrel or Windhover.) 



By Mr. G. D. ROWLEY. 



The social habits of this Hawk are mentioned by most writers, which habits 

 I imagine arise from the nature of its food ; for it is manifest that a raptor, 

 requiring flesh, must usually traverse a large extent of country. The Kestrel, 

 Hying on beetles and mice, is able to keep in flocks. 



" In Egypt," Mr. E. C. Taylor says, " it regales itself on a Hzard " (Ibis, 

 1869, vol. i. p. 45) ; and in the ' Handbook of the Birds of Egypt,' by G. E. 

 Shelley (p. 194}, we have locusts mentioned as its food: — "I saw at least 

 one hundred in a single clump of palm trees, doubtless attracted there by 

 the locusts, which were passing in dense continuous clouds beneath them." 



As a result of the Wild-Birds Protection Bill, the nature of which 

 the rustic population does not understand, the Kestrel has increased in 

 numbers. The bill has frightened the birds-nesters ; and the tax on guns has 

 also probably added to the general safety. Lincoln Cathedral has for many 

 years been a breeding-place of Kestrels, which enter the ventilating-holes 

 in the triforium, between the stone and wooden roof. Here they live, in 

 company with Pigeons and Jackdaws. The Hawks sit on the small towers — 

 one of which is called the Lady-Tower, and the other Hughe's Tower (the 

 latter contains the bells) ; the Pigeons fly round. Between the stone and 

 wooden roof are cartloads of sticks, carried up by the Jackdaws. 



On Saturday, May 14, 1859, I went to a Kestrel's nest in Huntingdon- 

 shire, in the middle of a rookery on a very high elm ; the young Rooks were 

 in close proximity. There were four young Hawks in the nest, and an tg^ 



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