290 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



8th. — Much barley still out and some not cut. 



10th. — Many Redwings. Larks sang in first few days of 

 month ; silent now. 



11th. — News of a Hobby shot at Hanwell in June. 



12th. — Song-Thrush sang well this evening. This is the 

 opening of the usual spell of song, which would go on here all 

 winter if the season were very mild. 



13th. — A Lark sang a very little. 



14th. — Snow. 



18th. — Wren still sings. 



23rd. — A Nuthatch here; only one since February. 



28th. — Song-Thrushes sing well, but not many here this 

 autumn. 



A good deal of frosty weather this month from the 6th 

 onwards. Rain on thirteen days only amounted to about '70 in., 

 but air damp. Wind N.W. 



December 3rd. — Enormous flocks of Starlings here now. A 

 great many Redwings, many Fieldfares, and swarms of Larks 

 and Finches on the stubbles. 



4th. — The fruit on three or four plum-trees was not gathered, 

 or hardly any of it. Much of this now remains, brown and 

 shrivelled, on the trees, and affords food for Thrushes, &c. 

 Some damsons left on a tree have not yet been eaten. Green- 

 finches now feeding on the berries of Cotoneaster lelandi and the 

 hips of sweetbriars ; they will stay in the garden in numbers so 

 long as the latter last. 



5th. — Aconite in flower, not quite turned up ; the earliest I 

 ever saw. Snow on ground early. 



7th. — Thrushes and Blackbirds eating the damsons. 



10th.— From 9.30 a.m. for an hour (when I had to leave) 

 Fieldfares were passing over (W.N.W. to E.S.E.) in straggling 

 loose flocks of twenty or thirty to fifty or sixty, at short intervals, 

 and at their usual height. I did not go out until 9.30, so I do 

 not know how long the flight had been going on, nor how long 

 it lasted. But I found later a great many in flocks feeding in 

 the big hedges which are red with haws ; and a lot of Redwings 

 too. There was a change to milder weather last night. 



11th. — Wren sings sometimes, but the cold has practically 

 silenced the Thrushes. 



