io8 



Spotted Redshank and Little Auks near Boston. 



nearly all die. In captivity it is an obstinate, furious, and 

 melancholy bird, and such a voracious eater as to be a most dis- 

 agreeable bird in the aviary. For food it requires insects, 

 caterpillars, and meat, and they must be given every few 

 minutes till it can feed itself. The reward of much patience 

 would certainly be a great addition to our knowledge, if a few 

 could be kept to maturity. 



I publish these notes, the summary of twenty years' work on 

 the Cuckoo, in the hope that some naturalist, who is a photo- 

 grapher, will take up this bird as a special study. We want 

 photographs of the Cuckoo visiting a nest prospecting, carrying 

 and placing its egg, removing eggs or young birds, and sucking 

 eggs, of the naked and blind nestling ejecting eggs or foster- 

 brothers. Anyone desirous of making a study of this bird 

 should especially make full notes on the following points :— 

 (i) Do the cock birds arrive first? (2) Are they more numerous 

 than the hens ? (3) Is the well-known spring-cry peculiar to 

 the male bird ? (4) All other sounds made by both sexes should 

 be noted. (5) How many species of birds' nests are used in 

 a given district. (6) How frequently the hen Cuckoo turns out 

 the eggs when she deposits her own. (7) If the foster-birds 

 ever turn out the egg she sometimes leaves in their nest before 

 they have laid any of their own. (8) The date when she lays 

 her first egg. (9) How many eggs she lays. (10) What is the 

 interval between them. (11) Egg marking and ground coloura- 

 tion in relation to the species in whose nest the egg is deposited, 

 and to the Cuckoo's eggs generally over a wide district. My 

 friend Mr. W. Denison Roebuck will only be too willing and 

 ready to publish any new or carefully-recorded facts illustrating 

 any of these points. Personally, I shall be very pleased to hear 

 from anyone who has observations to communicate. 



NOTES— ORNITHOLOGY. 

 Spotted Redshank near Boston. — A Spotted Redshank (To/a// us 

 fuscus) was recently shot in the Marsh, near Boston, by Captain Bottomley, 

 and is being- stuffed by Mr. Nash, successor to Mr. Fieldsend, at Lincoln. 

 I was recently told of another specimen of the same bird being- shot near 

 Hunstanton. — J. Conway Walter, Langton Rectory, Horncastle, 17th 

 March 1900. 



Little Auks at Boston. — At Boston two Little Auks (Mergirfus alle) 

 were captured after the late stormy weather. One of these was picked up 

 on 1st March by the groom of Mr. C. Wright, J. P., of Boston, lying in an 

 exhausted state on the lawn. 



Earlier in the same week, Mr. R. Sissons, engineer of the tug ' Boston,' 

 caught another in his landing--net, floating exhausted on the Witham. 



Both these are being stuffed by Mr. Wakefield, of West Street, Boston. 

 — J. Conway Walter, Langton Rectory, Horncastle, 24th March 1900. 



Naturalist. 



