BIRDS. 



247 



our remarks on this subject at p. 172. Less attention seems to 

 have been paid to Natural History in Moray one hundred years 

 ago, for instance, than in Argyll, where the population is mostly 

 Celtic, or was so. The Highlander knows birds better than the 

 average Lowlander for very obvious reasons, which have been 

 pointed out before.^ 



In 1893 Hinxman found the Dipper abundant far up Glen 

 Avon, and up the mountain streams, even to their sources on the 

 high levels of Cairngorm, but not nesting, he considers, higher 

 than 2000 feet. 



Family PARID^. 



Acred u la rosea (Blyth). Long-tailed Tit. 



A common and resident species ; more often seen in winter than in 

 summer, as in the former season it roams about in families. In 

 the summer it is more partial to birch woods, placing its nest 

 against the bark or in the fork of a birch-tree. Mr. Baillie writes 

 us that for some years back he has been unable to find a nest of 

 this bird in the woods about Brora, where once they were common. 

 They were observed at Badenloch for the first time in November 

 1890, probably on migration. 



No accessions to its numbers are observed in the winter. 

 Edward considered that it occurred in autumn in about equal 

 numbers with Great, Cole, and Blue Tits (see Life, p. 691), but we 

 can hardly indorse the remark even on Edward's own ground. We 

 think it commoner than the Great Tit, but much less abundant 

 than either the Blue or Cole Tit. We have only met with one 

 family party near Eothiemay in three years in the month of May. 

 We found it commoner at Aberlour on Spey in 1884 and 1885. 

 The Long-tailed Tit is also common up Glen Avon and Lower 

 Glenlivet, as observed both by Hinxman and Harvie-Brown. It 

 visits at times the sand-hills of the Culbins, and feeds on insects 

 there. As early as 1844 it was spoken of as common, but rarer 

 than the Cole Tit in Elgin. 



An old nest was found by Mr. J. Backhouse ^ in the birch 



^ Vide Squirrel in Scotland^ and Robertson's Gaelic Tojiography. 

 2 *J. Backhouse, Esq.,' formerly referred to as J. Backhouse, Estj., jxin.—i.t. 

 before the death of his father, Mr. J. Backhouse, the well-known botanist. 



