258 BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



attack. Then again, the winter immigration of 

 wood-pigeons from northern Europe appears to be 

 on the increase, and it may be conjectured that a 

 considerable number of these visitors remain annu- 

 ally to breed with us. 



There has also been an increase in the stock-dove 

 and turtle-dove in recent years, and the former 

 species is extending its range in the north. The 

 cause or causes of the increase of the turtle-dove 

 are not far to seek. Its chief feathered enemies, the 

 egg and fledgling robbers, are the same as the wood- 

 pigeon's ; moreover, the turtle-dove is least perse- 

 cuted by man of our four pigeons, and being strictly 

 migratory it quits the country before shooting-time 

 begins ; add to this that the turtle-dove has been 

 specially protected under Sir Herbert Maxwell's 

 Act of 1894 in a good number of English counties, 

 from Surrey to Yorkshire. 



Of the stock-dove we can only say that, like the 

 ring-dove, it has increased in spite of the persecution 

 it is subject to, since no person out after pigeons 

 would spare it because it is without a white collar. 

 With the exception of the county of Buckingham- 

 shire it is not on the schedule anywhere in the 

 country. One can only suppose that this species has 

 been indirectly benefited by the bird legislation and 

 all that has been done to promote a feeling favour- 

 able to bird-preservation during the last thirty years. 



