274 



BIRDS. 



It was not very abundant at Aberlour in 1884, but very plenti- 

 ful — old and young — along the outskirts of thirty- to forty-year- 

 old pine woods in July 1892, and still more abundant in opener 

 localities, a month earlier in the same year ; exceedingly common 

 in July between Lynwilg and Kincraig, and in the birch-woods 

 of Glen Tromie in August 1891. In 1892 a few pairs were 

 observed by us for the first time, during three years' trout-fishing 

 at the same spot, at Lesmurdie in Upper Deveron. It is common 

 in all the larger and better wooded valleys and principal glens, 

 but as yet rarer in the higher glens — ' glacs,' or ' slochs,' of the 

 Cam districts, and proportionately in the smaller ' dales ' — 'dells ' 

 and ' dens ' — of the coast east of Banff". William Evans, in June 

 1892, found only one pair at Dalwhinnie. Mr. C. H. Alston con- 

 siders it rare in Upper Badenoch (1890). 



In June 1893, we, for the first time during several successive 

 seasons, found one pair, just within the limits of the Upper 

 Cabrach, in a spot where they could scarcely have escaped our 

 notice in previous years had they been present, as we were con- 

 stantly in the habit of fishing that particular reach of the river 

 Deveron. We again saw also several pairs at Lesmurdie, in 

 Lower Cabrach reach of Upper Deveron. It was very abundant 

 all through the lower grounds and the Laigh of Moray. Hinxman 

 saw one as far up as Inchrory, on the Avon, in June, but he is 

 uncertain whether it nested or not. In the end of July 1894 

 we again found a pair about 100 yards below the spot which we 

 had found frequented by them in 1893, close to the bridge on the 

 lower confines of the Upper Cabrach. 



Muscicapa atricapilla, Pied Flycatcher. 



Though not occurring regularly every year, yet the Pied Flycatcher 

 is often found on both spring and autumn migration at the Pent- 

 land Skerries, and records of its appearance in the North go back 

 as far as 1809, when Messrs. Baikie and Heddle recorded it from 

 Sanday in Orkney. It is most probably from this great highway 

 of migrants through the Pentland Firth, that they visit the 

 Sutherland portion of our area, where we ourselves first noticed 

 one in a bum some eight or nine miles from Brora on May 27th, 

 1872, and the specimen is now in our possession. The next notice 

 of it was in 1881, when Mr. Houston saw a pair at his residence 



