174 Contributions to the 



Richard K. Siuclaire, Esq. who on the same day observed, in addition 

 to them, pairs of sea-eagles, peregrine falcons, and kestrels, all of 

 which are well known to have eyries there. 



A native specimen of the buzzard, which I lately examined, had a 

 few feathers half an inch in length about the middle of one of the 

 tarsi, which was bare for nine lines above them. 



Rough-legged Buzzard — Buteo lagopus, Vig. — About the 

 middle of October 1831, a bird of this species was killed near Dun- 

 donald, in the county of Down.* On dissection, the remains of birds 

 and of a full-grown rat were found in its stomach. It was purchased 

 by Br J. D. Marshall, and is now in his possession. This bird ac- 

 cords with Temminck's description of the adult male. It has not any 

 indication of bands on either side of the tail. In Mr Selby's figure 

 of the female, a band appears near the tip on the under side. 



About this time two others were seen at Killinchy, in the same 

 county, and one of them shot, but it was, through ignorance, lost as 

 a specimen. Last autumn, the gamekeeper at Tollymore Park de- 

 scribed to me a bird, which, from size, being feathered to the toes, 

 &c. evidently had been of this species. It was shot a few years ago 

 (probably at the same period as the others) in Castlewellan demesne 

 (Down) when carrying off a young rabbit. 



Honey-Buzzard — Pernis apivorus, Cuv. — The following no- 

 tice of this species appeared in the Magazine of Natural History for 

 1833, Vol. vi. p. 447. 



" At a meeting on July 23, 1833, of the Council of the Belfast Na- 

 tural History Society, Mr W. Thompson, V. P. stated, that, on the 

 11th of June last, a fine male specimen of the honey-buzzard, 

 which is unrecorded as having ever before occurred in Ireland, was, 

 when in company with a similar bird, most probably the female, shot 

 by Robert G. Bomford, Esq. in his demesne of Annandale, in the vi- 

 cinity of Belfast ; and who, on being informed of the rarity of the 

 bird, had most handsomely presented it to the Belfast Museum. Mr 

 Thompson, who saw the specimen when recent, related, that the bill 

 and forehead were covered with cow-dung, in such a manner as to 

 lead him to suppose the bird had in that substance been searching for 

 insects. On examination of the stomach, which was quite full, it was 

 found to contain a few of the larvae, and some fragments of coleop- 



* This is the individual mentioned in " Mag. Nat. Hist." Vol. v. p. 578. 



