THE MAMMALIAN FAUNA OF CHESHIRE. 



173 



the Barn Owl. We have examined a great number of pellets 

 from this locality, and have found only a few skulls of glareolus ; 

 whereas the skulls of agrestis exceed those of all the other mam- 

 mals together. In old meadows this species is often so numerous 

 as to be a perfect plague, not only on account of the amount it 

 actually eats, but because its nests clog the knives of the mowing- 

 machines when the grass is cut. In winter, holly-bushes may be 

 seen in the hedgerows with the smaller twigs stripped of bark, 

 and though in some cases the damage may be done by Bank 

 Voles, in others the present species is certainly the culprit 



(« 



Fig. 2. — Lower molars of (a) agrestis, (b) glareolus, x 5^. 



(c/. Zool. 1890, p. 98). The abundance of this and the next 

 species is doubtless to some extent due to the constant persecution 

 of their natural enemies, Kestrels, Barn Owls, and Weasels. 



M, glareolus (Schreb.) ; Bank Vole. — This species is com- 

 mon and generally distributed, but has been much overlooked 

 in Cheshire, as is doubtless the case in other parts of the country. 

 In the neighbourhood of Sale, Northenden, and Gatley, the Bank 

 Vole is extremely numerous in hedge-banks where there is a 

 sufficient amount of undergrowth to afford it the covert it delights 

 in, and we have trapped as many as six in one hedgerow in a 

 single night. The Rev. C. Wolley-Dod states (in lit.) that it is 

 abundant at Edge, near Malpas. Mr. E. Newstead has sent us 

 teeth taken from the stomach of a Kestrel from Eaton, and from 



