NOTES AND QUERIES. 437 



Shearwater, Puffinus griseus (Gmelin). It has been well preserved by Mr. 

 Bristow, of St. Leouard's-on-Sea, and is now in my collection. — William 

 Borrer (Cowfold, near Horsham). 



Jackdaw killing Rats. — " During a stay at Northwich, Cheshire, in 

 the spring of this year," my brother wrote me, " while superintending .... 

 my attention w T as drawn, by Ashworth, an ex-gamekeeper, to the unusual 

 behaviour of a Daw, which was seen to suddenly swoop down by the side of 

 the river Weaver, and immediately rise again, with a full-grown Water Rat 

 in its claws, to a height of about forty feet, when the rat was dropped. 

 This the Jackdaw repeated seven or eight times, until the rat's life was 

 extinct; then, giving a triumphant * caw,' he picked the animal up in his 



beak, and made the best of his way to a neighbouring steeple The 



method resorted to in this case is exactly similar to the plan they have, on 

 the sea-coast, of opening mollusks." — C. E. Stott (Lostock, Bolton-le- 

 Moors). 



Extraordinary abundance of the Corn Crake near Waterford.— 

 In counties Dublin aud Wicklow, both this year and last, there has been 

 a very noticeable scarcity of Corn Crakes, and many persons have remarked 

 it to me; whereas near Waterford these birds were so abundant this 

 summer that during the cutting of a meadow of perhaps four acres a 

 hundred or more were driven out, the last perch or so that was left uncut in 

 the centre of the field being literally alive with them. It was a curious 

 sight to watch the Crakes rising in twos and threes from the ever- 

 diminishing patch of grass, or running, mouse-like, among the swathes of 

 fresh-cut hay, while the hapless young were destroyed in dozens by the 

 machine. — Allan Ellison (Trinity College, Dublin). 



Increase of the Redstart in West Scotland.— W T hen at Ballachulish 

 for a short time in August last, I was much struck by the extraordinary 

 numbers of Redstarts. The birch-woods on the sides of some of the hills 

 were full of them, whereas I did not see a single bird of this species when 

 at the same place five years ago, although there were, no doubt, a few pairs 

 in the district. Unless the increase is merely local, it will be strange if this 

 bird does not very shortly make its appearance in the Hebrides. — Arthur 

 H. Macpherson. 



Nesting Habits of the Dipper. — Your correspondents will observe 

 that when I used the words " never in a tree," speaking of the position of 

 the Dipper's nest (p. 314), I referred merely to the breeding habits of this 

 bird as observed by myself in the Co. Wicklow, where I have never heard of 

 a nest so situated. The position of some of the nests, described as having 

 been found in trees, bears a strong resemblance to the ordinary situation in 

 a bank or under a bridge. Mr. Goldsmith (p. 352) describes a nest against 

 the truuk of a willow tree, supported by the projecting stump of a branch ; 



