BIRDS MET WITH IN EAST FINMABE. 



267 



suited to the Wheatear, being all birch forest, and even on the open 

 fjeld these birds were quite rare ; only one was seen. 



Bluethroat [Cyanecula suecica). — Met with constantly in the marshy 

 willow scrub in the valley, and almost every marshy bottom on the high 

 fjeld, if it contained willow scrub, held its pair or two of Bluethroats. 

 Its song was constantly heard, and for variety and beauty beats any 

 other song I have yet heard. Now and then we would hear some 

 strange new song, and would spend some time carefully stalking the 

 singer, only to find it was our little friend the Bluethroat again. 

 When the young are hatched the cock, like our Nightingale, stops 



Nest of Bluethroat. 



singing, and utters a harsh churring note. Both parents feed the 

 brood, and at this time are much bolder and less skulking than usual. 

 The nests, we believe, are very hard to find, and certainly we have 

 found them so in other parts of Norway ; so we must consider ourselves 

 very lucky in having found three. A fourth we spent several hours 

 over, watching the birds going backwards and forwards with food ; but 

 owing to the dense scrub on the banks of a stream, into which they 

 disappeared, we could never successfully watch them on. Two of our 

 nests were found by sheer luck, the hens flying off at our feet when 

 walking through swampy scrub. The first was a neat round nest, 



