BIRDS 381 



Dunlin trilled. Once we saw five Dunlin stoop to and settle 

 around a Golden Plover, waiting as sedately as the Plover. 

 But this attendance of the Dunlin upon its larger neighbour is 

 only a feature of our fell lands. The two species sometimes 

 nest thinly on the same mosses near the coast ; but there the 

 Golden Plover is a scarce breeding-bird, while the Dunlin nests 

 in considerable numbers upon certain portions of Burgh and 

 Rockliffe marshes, as also near Silloth. The home-breeding 

 Dunlins do not seem to winter on these marshes, though I saw 

 a flock of at least a thousand birds wheeling round the point of 

 Rockliffe marsh on December 1, on the occasion of a high tide. 

 Certain it is that some individuals are always present. Once I 

 shot a Dunlin on Rockliffe marsh on the 19th of January, and 

 found it was already moulting into spring plumage, as evidenced 

 by the fresh wing coverts and upper tail coverts. 



But the Dunlin does not generally begin to lay before the 

 beginning of May. The earliest broods of young generally 

 hatch out about the 21st of that month. Most eggs are laid 

 from the middle of May to the middle of June, the nest being 

 a tolerably deep depression in a tussock of grass, lined, when the 

 clutch is complete, with short stems of dry grass. The birds 

 are charmingly tame at this season, tripping about and flying 

 round in pairs. It is pretty to watch a male Dunlin carefully 

 preening his breast and coverts, occasionally stretching his 

 neck a little forward to utter a deep running trill as an 

 encouragement to his mate, which probably responds by running 

 up to his side and settling down to trim her feathers. One day I 

 watched a couple of breeding Dunlins posing contentedly on the 

 edge of Rockliffe marsh, until the flowing tide forced them to 

 swim back to land, which feat they accomplished without the 

 least show of reluctance. The colour of those which breed on 

 the salt marshes is not so bright as that of the smaller birds 

 which nest on the Pennine range. Although so pleasantly 

 associated with the sea pinks of Rockliffe marsh, it would be a 

 mistake to suppose that all the Dunlins which frequent our 

 estuaries in summer are breeding-birds. Some of those seen in 

 large droves in May are doubtless on passage to more boreal 

 breeding-stations, but, as with most Waders, there are a good 



