288 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



there is no lack of water ; but this spring was extraordinarily 

 dry, so that the streams were very empty, and much of the boggy 

 ground on the hills was boggy no longer. To come to the birds 

 themselves. 



The Thrushes were represented by the Song Thrush (Turdus 

 musicus), Fieldfare (T. pilaris), Kedwing (T. iliacus), and the 

 King Ouzel (T. torquatus), but I observed neither the Mistle 

 Thrush (T. viscivorus) nor Blackbird (T. merula). The Fieldfares 

 generally breed in colonies, often consisting of a large number of 

 pairs, and offering much to interest a lover of birds. The 

 approach of a suspicious character, be it in the form of man, 

 beast, or bird, is proclaimed by a great outcry among the 

 colonists, whose note of alarm is not very unlike the sound made 

 by a policeman's rattle. The general clamour and excitement 

 does not fall far short of that caused by an intrusion into a 

 rookery. Unlike Books, however, more than one pair of Field- 

 fares' never occupies the same tree. The nests are placed with 

 little or no attempt at concealment, which indeed is a matter of 

 some difficulty at the season when they commence to build, before 

 the birches are in leaf. The commonest position is the fork 

 which a branch of a tree makes with the stem ; but many other 

 situations are chosen, and those at all heights above the ground, 

 though I have never found one actually on the ground, as is 

 often the case with the Eedwing. A low shrub of juniper is not 

 an unusual position. The materials usually employed are grass 

 and mud, with a lining of finer grasses ; but I found a nest, the 

 exterior of which was thickly covered with the white feathers of 

 the Eyper, making it very conspicuous. The bird does not sit 

 very close, generally flying off when her particular tree is 

 approached, and joining in the chorus of maledictions. 



But it is not on account of the Fieldfares alone that such a 

 colony is interesting — it is so also because many small birds are 

 in the habit of breeding in its vicinity; in which they show their 

 wisdom, for they would not easily find more watchful sentinels 

 or pluckier champions. This applies especially to the Brambling, 

 and I do not think I visited a colony without seeing or hearing- 

 one or a pair of those handsome birds near at hand. The chief 

 persecutors of the Fieldfares are the Hooded Crows, who, in spite 

 of the attempts of the parent birds to scare them away, contrive 

 to carry off a large proportion of the unfledged youug. In one 



