NOTES AND QUERIES. 431 



has actually been used, as the Wrynecks have entirely removed that, 

 together with the eggs it has contained. I remember, about forty 

 years ago, seeing Wryneck's eggs taken from a Wren's nest in an 

 orchard at Owlsbury, in the adjoining parish of Little Horsted. I am 

 afraid the Wryneck is less common now than it was in those days, 

 though I should not like to suggest that it was so numerously 

 represented as to have any difficulty in finding suitable holes in 

 which to lay. Of course we know some of the larger birds will 

 make use of an old nest of their own species, or otherwise, but I 

 should suppose it far less common with our smaller birds. — Kobeet 

 Mobbis (Uckfield, Sussex). 



Ornithological Notes from Yorkshire. — A good many — if not 

 most — writers on British birds state that the Blackcap (Sylvia 

 atricapilla) is much commoner and more local than its congener 

 the Garden- Warbler (Sylvia hortensis). The relative status of 

 these two species does not apply to this district nor to many, 

 if not most, other parts of Yorkshire ; more particularly is this 

 the case in the north and north-west Yorkshire. Both species 

 vary in numbers within certain limit every year, but I have never 

 known a year in which the Garden- Warbler has been scarcer than 

 the Blackcap. In many districts I have visited the Blackcap is a 

 general term applied indiscriminately to any bird with a black head, 

 such, for instance, as the Marsh and Cole Tits, and even the Great 

 Tit ; and this confusion, I fear, has often given rise to the idea that 

 the Blackcap is much more common and generally distributed than 

 is actually the case. Judging from my own observations there must 

 be many districts other than in Yorkshire where the Blackcap 

 is much less common than the Garden- Warbler, and I should be very 

 pleased to have any notes from readers of the ' Zoologist ' regarding the 

 relative status of these species. Has there been any change observable 

 in the relative numbers of these species of late years ? The Garden- 

 Warbler is not usually regarded as such a hardy bird as the Blackcap, 

 and at first sight it would appear that the latter species would be 

 much more at home in north-west Yorkshire, but such is not 

 the case. 



On October 16th I saw a party of small birds at a distance beside 

 the stream which runs near this village. On my approach they flew 

 off a short distance near a poultry cote, around which I cautiously 

 crept, and had a very fine view of a cock Mealy Eedpoll (Linota 

 linaria) feeding very greedily upon the seeds of Meadow Sweet 

 (Ulmaria). The other birds had evidently flown away. It permitted 



