370 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



fashion of Jackdaws dropping and tumbling around each other 

 when in flight, like tumbler Pigeons, evidently pairing. 



Dunlins. —It blew hard from the west to-day (March 6th). 

 A flock of Dunlins washed off the flooded flats flew to the south 

 rond to alight. The near birds alighted first, when the others 

 dropped down in the rear of them, flying backwards, keeping 

 their heads to wind. They sat there in so dense a body that 

 a score might have been covered with a pocket-handkerchief. 



March 12th. — Several Curlews on Breydon and some Grey 

 Plovers. 



March 14th. — Rooks coming over in thousands, passing due 

 west, many extremely tired. 



March 18th. — A yellow morning. Atmosphere colour of 

 pea-soup. Wind from north ; snowing all day. Saw a few adult 

 Herring-Gulls and some very white Sanderlings. Breydon like 

 a tumbling sea. 



Wig eon. — There were quite five hundred Wigeon on Breydon 

 on the 18th. On the 21st it was like a summer lake. I went 

 round in the punt, seeing plenty of Dunlins, thirty Curlews in 

 one flock, many Black-headed Gulls, and some Common Gulls, 

 adult and young. Quite three hundred and fifty Wigeon busy 

 on the Zostera near the watcher's houseboat. The fronds of this 

 grass, discarded by the Ducks for the succulent stalk, began 

 daily to float down-stream in biggish patches. 



Quite one hundred Ringed-Plovers on the flats on March 24th. 



March 26th. — A Woodcock of the smaller dark variety had 

 been picked up on the sea-front, having struck a telegraph wire, 

 cutting its crop completely open. 



Crows and Mussels. — At low-water on Breydon the Hooded 

 Crows repair to the emptied grups and wrench off Mussels, 

 which they find attached to sunken flints and other hard sub- 

 stances. With these they repair to the " walls." Years ago, 

 when nearly all the water-ward sides of them were faced by 

 jagged flintstones, these were used as anvils on which to drop 

 and break the shells ; in many cases the mollusc fell into gaps 

 between and was lost. To-day the birds make for the concreted 

 slopes, easily retrieving the shellfish at the base. Small Mus- 

 sels are pecked open on the hard clayey apex ; the larger ones 

 only are dropped. On March 27th the " walls " were be- 



