NOTES AND QUERIES. 229 



Terns feeding upon Sticklebacks. — In some of the dykes in Holland 

 Sticklebacks abound. I repeatedly watched both Black and Common 

 Terns fishing for them and feeding upon them. — E. Fortune (5, 

 Grosvenor Terrace, East Parade, Harrogate). 



Large Clutches of Eggs. — During a recent nesting excursion fco 

 Holland, I saw an Avocet's nest containing five eggs, a Godwit's with 

 six eggs, and a Eedshank's with six eggs. The Godwit had four eggs 

 when we first found it, the additional two eggs being in the nest when 

 we visited it three days afterwards. The probabilities are, of course, 

 that two birds laid in the same nest, though this was not very appa- 

 rent, and there should be no reason for it, for upon the vast area of 

 polders nesting-places are of course abundant. On May 28th, in a 

 nesting-box at Harrogate, I found a Blue Tit sitting upon seventeen 

 eggs. This box is fixed in an oak-tree in the centre of a large wood, 

 and is about twenty-five feet from the ground. We have a few boxes 

 about, and they are all tenanted by Blue and Great Tits. A neigh- 

 bouring box contained a Great Tit's nest with one egg, and the female 

 dead upon the nest, egg-bound. — E. Fortune (5, Grosvenor Terrace, 

 East Parade, Harrogate). 



A Note on Bird-Life in the Spessart. — A few notes on the birds 

 observed during a journey on foot through this district, in the com- 

 pany of a German ornithologist, may be of interest. The notes were 

 made between March 24th and 28th, 1910, at which date some migra- 

 tion was apparently in progress. The Spessart, I should state, is a 

 forest district in the north-west corner of Bavaria, about thirty or 

 forty miles from north to south, and rather less from east to west. 

 It is bounded on three sides by the Eiver Main, which makes a deep 

 bend. The forest consists of oaks, beeches, and conifers. The highest 

 points are about two thousand feet high, and are densely wooded. 

 The valley of the river is cultivated for a mile or two on either side of 

 the meadows, which abut on the swift gliding stream. Bird-life was 

 very abundant, though the total number of species was not large. 

 The most interesting and characteristic birds of the forest are probably 

 the Great Black Woodpecker, the Kite, and the Buzzard. But it will 

 be better to go through the list in order. There were a few Mistle- 

 Thrushes in the forest, and song-Thrushes were rather more nume- 

 rous ; the last species, I was told, being only a summer visitor. Black- 

 birds were quite absent from the forest, but I saw a few in the village 

 gardens in the Main Valley. On the evening of March 27th I heard 

 the first Chiffchaff singing feebly at Wertheim, and on the two follow- 

 ing days, as we walked down the valley, they were singing in their 



