ORNITHOLOGICAL REPORT FOR NORFOLK. 127 
announced. A single Little Auk was sent to Mr. Roberts; this was 
perhaps a returning bird from the passage noted two months pre- 
viously, fortunate enough to have escaped death from starvation. 
2nd.—On the 2nd Mr. Gerard Gurney put up the ubiquitous 
Green Sandpiper, to which no season of the year seems to come 
amiss, and on the 6th a Norfolk Plover, much behindhand, was 
seen near the coast by the Rev. M.C. Bird, the same belated bird 
being observed again on the 20th by the keeper. 
14th.—On the 14th a Knot was shot at Hellesdon, nearly 
twenty miles from the sea; evidently it had followed the river, 
and may have come with a party of waders which were heard by 
Mr. B. B. Riviere the same night passing over the lighted city 
of Norwich. On the 21st Mr. F. H. Barclay flushed a Bittern 
on Hoveton Broad, where rare birds are protected; and on the 
25th Mr. Pinchin identified two Mealy Redpolls near the sea. 
28th.—The end of the month produced the first novelty, one 
of the Yarmouth birdcatchers bringing Mr. Lowne a cock Serin- 
Finch, which he had caught on the North Denes, a very favourite 
haunt of the bird-netting fraternity. This is the fifth, if not the 
sixth, Serin-Finch which has been netted at Yarmouth, and I 
believe they have all been cocks; yet at Blakeney none have been 
taken, but there is no netting there. We do not know what 
governs the separation of the sexes in the Fringillide, well 
exemplified in the Chaffinch and Brambling, but which ceases at 
the end of February. 
FEBRUARY. 
No notes. 
Marcu. 
ist.—During most of February I was watching birds in the 
Pyrenees, and have no more notes until the beginning of March, 
when a Sea-Hagle, said to have weighed sixteen pounds—which 
is hardly credible—was shot on a sporting estate at Downham, 
and forthwith went the round of the papers as a Golden Eagle! 
erd.—Three Snipe’s eggs found by the keeper (M. C. Bird) ; 
very early. 
25th.—Some Redstarts, which were probably Black Redstarts, 
seen at Yarmouth by Mr. A. Patterson, and about the same time 
Several were reported from Lowestoft by Mr. C. B. Ticehurst. 
The Black Redstart is either commoner, or more observed than 
