232 CHOUGH. 
In several of the Channel Islands the Chough was formerly 
common, and it breeds in some of the rocky portions of the north- 
western and west coasts of France, as well as in those of the 
Peninsula. Mountainous situations in the Alps, Carpathians, Par- 
nassus, Urals, Apennines, Pyrenees, Cantabrian range, and the 
south of Spain, are, however, its favourite haunts, while on the 
rocky islands of the Mediterranean it is plentiful ; it is also resident 
in the hill-regions of Northern Africa, Abyssinia, Arabia, Asia 
Minor, the Caucasus and Persia, and throughout the mountain 
ranges of Asia as far as North-eastern China. Asa rule this species 
is little given to wandering. 
The nest, built from the latter part of April to the middle of 
May, is composed of long wiry stems of heather, or of some 
deciduous plant, and is well lined with wool and hair. It is 
frequently placed in some cavity in the roof of a cave; but some- 
times in vertical fissures, holes in ruins and grassy banks, or disused 
lime-kilns. The 3-5 eggs are greyish-white with occasionally a 
yellow or greenish tinge, spotted and streaked with several shades 
of dark grey and pale brown: measurements 1°5 by 11 in. When 
flying, the Chough performs a series of curves in the air, alternately 
rising with a scream and then suddenly dropping with almost closed 
wings, but on the ground its movement isa short and very quick 
run. The usual cry is a clear metallic Aémg, but in autumn I 
have heard flocks uttering chough-chough very plainly. The food 
consists of insects and their larvee (in search of which stones are 
often turned over), and occasionally of grain. 
In the adult male the plumage is glossy bluish-black, witha 
slight green tint on the primaries; bill, legs, and feet cherry-red. 
Length 16 in.; wing 11 in. The female only differs in being some- 
what smaller. In the nestling the beak and legs are dull orange, 
but by September those parts have become as red as in the parent. 
A yellow-billed Alpine Chough, P. a/ginus, shot near Banbury, 
Oxfordshire, on April 8th 1881, and examined in the flesh by Mr. 
O. V. Aplin, is now in the collection of Mr. J. Whitaker. The 
species is eminently sedentary, and it is unlikely that an individual 
should have wandered so far from its home in the mountains of 
Central and Southern Europe; on the other hand I believe that 
Lady Dorothy Nevill, who has been successful in inducing our 
species to breed in confinement, has purchased importations from 
the Continent, and it is probable that the bird in question had 
escaped. 
