2 
The Irish Naiuralist, 
January, 
Since 1909 there has undoubtedly been another increase 
of breeding Crossbills in Ireland, and this is probably a 
result of the large incursion noticed that year. Of course 
there may have been further reinforcements, but these 
must have been on a comparatively small scale. I think 
the birds have been more in evidence during the past 
twelve months (1915) than in any year since 1910. Of 
their presence in Co. Dublin early last summer proof was 
afforded me by the characteristic note of a small company 
that flew over my head during a walk not far from the 
city. In Co. Wicklow Mr. Barrington had the satisfaction 
of being able to watch a pair feeding their young in the nest 
at Fassaroe, and evidence of their presence in another part 
of the county was seen by the Dublin Naturalists' Field 
Club during its excursion to the Glen of the Downs, on 
July loth, when some cones (Scotch Fir) that had been 
prized open by Crossbills were picked up under a tree by 
the roadside. Co. Wexford has also been again visited by 
them, and if I may judge from the large number of crossbill - 
opened cones that I found under the trees when I came 
down here in the middle of July, some families of the 
birds had probably bred in the woods. At any rate, they 
were still going about in small parties, that must have 
frequented the spot since at least the latter part of the 
spring. 
In one respect the Crossbills of the present invasion 
seem to differ in their feeding taste from their predecessors 
of the invasion of 1888. At least, that is the result of my 
observations at Ballyhyland, and the single instance of 
the few cones picked up in the Glen of the Downs during 
the Field Club excursion last June points in the same 
direction. The Crossbills now with us do not show the 
preference that was so strongly displaj^ed by our visitors 
in the " Nineties " for cones of the Larch, but feed with 
equal and even greater readiness on those of the Scotch 
Fir. Our visitors here in 1892 and 1894 (as I mentioned 
in a form.er article in this journal^) sometimes made a 
meal of the seeds of Pimis sylvestris, which they were 
1 Vol. iii., p. 207. 
