THE COMMONER BIRDS OF OUR GARDENS. 



437 



Together with the Cole-tit and Long-tailed tit they help to keep down 

 winter and codlin moths, apple-blossom weevil, and aphides in all stages, 

 from egg upwards. The note of this bird is said to be like the sharpening 

 of a saw. Great tits probably pair for life, or at least for more than one 

 season. A pair keep together during the winter. Yarrell mentions that 

 mixed parties of tits, a dozen or more together, may be seen rummaging 

 about among decayed leaves, most frequently under beech trees. 



Gilbert White mentions the great tit as pulling straw out of thatch, 

 apparently in search of insects. It lays from six to twelve eggs in each 

 clutch, and two broods are produced in a season. In the Natural History 

 Museum at South Kensington is a village letter-box from Rowfant, Sussex, 

 in which great tits for several years made their nest and reared their 

 young, although letters were posted daily, and were often found on the 

 back of the sitting bird. The birds entered and left the nest by the slit 

 for the letters. 



Mr. Theobald speaks of the long- tailed tit as always common around 

 Wye, in Kent, and most beneficial : it eats scale, woolly aphis, and bud 

 scales ; it pecks buds containing Eriophyes pruni. 



The long-tailed tit and cole-tit eat larva? and aphides. The long-tailed 

 tit eats caterpillars of Ermine moth and scale on apple, gooseberry, and 

 red currant ; also woolly aphis and insect eggs. 



Mr. Theobald says the cole-tit feeds largely in winter on laburnum-leaf 

 miner and lilac-leaf roller caterpillars. 



Yellow Hammer : Emberiza citrinclla. 



This beautiful and common bird is sometimes seen in gardens, but is 

 more often associated with a dusty country road in summer time, flitting 

 from hedge to hedge as one walks along. 



Its note resembles " a little bread and no cheese." In winter it 

 congregates with sparrows, chaffinches, and greenfinches, and visits the 

 stubbles and farmyards, feeding largely on grain and weed seeds, parti- 

 cularly docks ; but in summer it eats insects and caterpillars and feeds its 

 young on the same. This is a resident bird, and Yarrell says that in 

 the Eastern Counties in winter their numbers are much augmented by 

 immigration from the Continent. 



In Italy it is fattened for table purposes. Its eggs are four or five 

 in number, and, like the other buntings, are covered with the curious 

 scribble-like markings which serve to distinguish them from those of 

 other British birds. 



Bullfinch : Pyrrhula europaea. 



This handsome and attractive bird is shy and retiring. The male bird 

 has a pink breast, that of the female is grey ; both have black heads and 

 beaks, and they are usually seen in pairs both in winter and summer ; 

 they are seldom seen associating with birds of any other species. In 

 flight the white band across the back is conspicuous, but they are more 

 often heard than seen. Their food consists of the leaves and immature 

 seeds' of docks, thistles, ragwort, groundsel, cbickweed and plantain, wild 

 fruits and berries, particularly dog-rose and privet ; but their grievous 



