ON THE WOOD-CHAT. 



167 



It is useless, I presume, to combat Button's idea, that the wood-chat 

 and the flusher might with propriety form one and the same species. 

 According to similar principles he pretends that all foreign butcher- 

 birds, which have red in their plumage, are merely varieties of the same 

 species. How are these notions to be reconciled with the changes 

 which he imagines birds unceasingly undergo, in the different climates 

 which they inhabit; and why should the red only be free from change? 



The male wood-chat is rather larger than the female; the latter is 

 easily distinguished by the absence of that deep red colour on the head 

 and behind the neck, which is the peculiar attribute of the male. 



In its young age this bird is so different from its appearance at a 

 later period, that, in this state, it has been described by many ornitho- 

 logists as a mere variety of the flusher, — an error into which Brisson 

 has been led by Aldrovand, who first mentioned this bird without having 

 any knowledge of it ; see Brisson's Ornithology (ii. p. 154), who like- 

 wise describes this variety of age, under the name of the variegated 

 red-backed shrike (JL'ecorcheur varie), avowing his uncertainty whether 

 it was not the female of the flusher. I refer the reader for other par- 

 ticulars to figure 2 of plate 64 (Oiseaux d'Afrique), in which this bird 

 is represented, and which is beyond all question a wood-chat in its first 

 young age, and not a variety of the flusher. I am certain on this point, 

 having examined and pursued, both in Africa and Europe, more than 

 twenty broods of this species, and having reared several young ones. 



ON THE WOOD-CHAT. 



BY II . M. D. 



Your correspondent A. T. makes mention of his having shot a female 

 wood-chat (Lanius rufus, as described by Bewick), which was in 

 company with a male red-backed shrike {Lanius Collurio), and also 

 of his never having been able to meet with the male wood-chat nor the 

 female red-backed shrike, which confirms my opinion that Bewick 

 has mistaken either the female or the young of L. Collurio for the 

 female L. rufus; but I rather think it to be the latter. Indeed, I 

 feel very much mistaken if (L. rufus) is a native of Britain at all. 

 However, I should feel very much obliged to any of your correspondents 

 if they could point out any instance of the male bird being seen in this 



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