22 BRITISH BIRDS’ EGGS. 
PIED FLYCATCHER. 
MuscIcaPa ATRICAPILLA, Linn. 
Pl. VL, fig. 11. 
Geogr. distr.—Europe in summer; eastward as far as Persia; 
Africa as far southward as the Gambia in winter; in Great Britain it 
is local, especially in Scotland and Wales. 
Food.—Insects. 
Nest.—Loosely constructed of moss, rootlets, and dried bents, lined 
with wool, feathers, or hair. 
Position of nest.—Usually in the deserted hole of a Woodpecker or 
Tit in an old oak, beech, aspen, or chestnut tree in a grove; rarely in 
a dense wood. 
Number of eggs.—4-6; rarely as many as 8. 
Time of nidification.—V-VI. 
This species is said to return constantly to the same 
place to breed year after year, and, though usually a 
hole in a tree is selected for this purpose, the nest is 
sometimes placed in a hole in a wall or bridge, especially 
near to water; formerly it was supposed to be strictly a 
northern species during the breeding season, Cumberland 
and Westmoreland being its favourite places of resort, and 
Derbyshire being regarded as an improbable county in 
which to find the nest; in the ‘ Zoologist’ for 1877, 
however, a specimen is said to have been seen in Wilt- 
shire in April, and a second shot in Hampshire in May.* 
It is known to breed regularly in some parts of Yorkshire, 
Durham, in a few places in N. Wales and the English 
counties of the Welsh border, and occasionally in N. Devon, 
Somerset, Gloucester, Oxford, Dorset, the Isle of Wight, 
Surrey, and Norfolk; Mr. Hargitt has obtained eggs from 
Invernesshire, and it is said to be tolerably common in 
the Orkneys. 
*The discovery of a nest would certainly have been more interesting, 
as the birds may have been passing northwards when seen; it has, 
however, been known to nest in Wiltshire. 
