96 BRITISH BIRDS. 



FRINGILLA MONTIPRINGILLA. 

 BRAMBLING. 



(Plate 13.) 



Oarduelis sueoica, Briss. Orn, iii. p. 63 (1760). 



Passer montifriugilla, Sriss. 0>-n. iii. p. 155 (1760) ; et auctorum plurimomm— 

 (ScopoU), {Omelm), (Latham), (Bonaparte), (Temminck), (DegUnd Sf Qet-be), 

 (Salvadon), (Newton), (Dresser), &c. 

 Fringilla montifringilla, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 318 (1766). 

 ' Fringilla lulensis, Linn. Syst. Nat. i, p. 318 (1766). 

 Fringilla flammea, Beseke, Vog. Kurl. p. 79 (1821). 

 Struthus montifringilla (Briss.), Boie, Isis, 1828, p. 323. 

 Fringilla septentrionalis, Brehm, Vog. Dmtschl. p. 274 (1831). 

 FringiUa media, Jaiib. Rev. et Mag. de Zool. v. p. 117 (1853). 



The Bramtling is only known as a winter migrant to our islands, 

 arriving late in the autumn and remaining until early in the following 

 spring. Its visits are exceedingly irregular and erratic, and districts 

 frequented by thousands of the hirds one year may be entirely deserted the 

 next. Apart from this the bird is generally distributed throughout our 

 islands in winter ; but it appears to be less numerous in the extreme west 

 of England, and in the Channel Islands its appearance is only exceptional. 

 In Scotland it is perhaps more numerous than in England and as widely 

 dispersed, although it only sparingly visits the inner islands of the west 

 coast, and probably never reaches the outer islands at all. The Shetland 

 Islands are only used by this bird as a resting-place on its annual journeys 

 to and from its northern breeding-grounds. A small flock once visited the 

 Faroes. In Ireland the Brambling is probably as widely distributed as in 

 England and Scotland ; but Mr. Watters states that its numbers gradually 

 decline as it reaches the south. The Brambling has been reported to have 

 bred several times in the British Islands ; but such a circumstance is very 

 improbable, and until more decisive proofs have been obtained than those 

 already put forward, the statement cannot be accepted. 



The Brambling is confined to the eastern hemisphere, and ranges from 

 the Atlantic to the Pacific. It breeds throughout the northern portions 

 of the Palsearctic Region, frequenting the pine- and especially the birch- 

 forests at or near the limit of forest-growth. In Scandinavia it breeds as 

 far south as lat. 60"; but in the valley of the Amoor, where the mean tem- 

 perature is so much lower, it breeds as low as lat. 50°. It wanders south- 

 wards in winter, a few birds remaining in the southern limits of its breeding- 

 range, but others straying as far south as Southern Europe and even 

 Algeria. It also winters in Asia Minor, Turkestan, the north-west Hima- 



