AUGUST 161 



course. With the goldfinch, too, family duties often 

 run on well into August. Some ring-doves are 

 flocking, but others are still cooing in the plantations, 

 and are likely enough to bring off a late brood this 

 month or next. The moorhens' nest, in a tuft of flags 

 bordering the old moat, still contains eggs, as does 

 also the floating heap of water-weeds which serves the 

 dabchick as a nursery. These exceptions merely 

 serve to show up the fact that with August we have 

 reached the extreme fag-end of the breeding season, 

 upon the close of which the moult follows as a natural 

 sequence. The young of the earlier broods have indeed 

 left far behind them the inexperience of nestling days, 

 and begin to put on the toga virilis, the garb of their 

 elders. In the case of the young chaffinches and 

 bullfinches the reddening breasts of the cocks now 

 indicate their sex. We may even surprise the young 

 blackbirds in transition dress, with patches of black 

 showing amongst the spotted brown of their nestling 

 plumage. Amongst the young wild-ducks, too, it is 

 now easy to pick out the drakes . In other cases j u venile 

 dress is worn for a much longer period. A young 

 shrike only showed himself in his true colours, as a 

 fine male bird, after eight months residence in our 

 aviary. 



Upon the coast the young gulls furnish the un- 

 initiated with a standing puzzle. There are spotted 

 Black-backs and Herring Gulls, fresh from the nesting 



u 



