TJic Scottish Naturalist. 
37 
throat, I am not aware that it is common in any, much less many, parts of 
Scotland. 
The Marsh Titmouse {Fanis paliistris), we are told, is " very rare" in the 
north and east of Ireland, and unknown in the south and west of that 
country ; and then Mr. Seebohm proceeds to say that curiously enough it is 
almost as rare in Scotland as in Ireland. That the Marsh Titmouse is 
abundant in some districts, at least, of this country is well shown by Mr. 
William Evans in his interesting paper on the birds of the Spey District, at 
page 8 of this number of " The Scottish Naturalist." 
In his remarks on the Woodpeckers, Mr. Seebohm is more satisfactory, but 
still, so far as they apply to one species, his remarks are not correct. Of the 
Green Woodpecker {Gecinus viridis) he says it can only be regarded as a 
rare and accidental visitor to Ireland and Scotland, and this is no doubt 
correct. The Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocojms 7ninor), and the 
Great Spotted Woodpecker [Dendrocopus major), are described as very rare in 
Scotland. This is also true as regards the former species. Of the latter, 
however, although it is questionable if the bird is now resident in Scotland — 
and is, perhaps, more than rare, in this respect — yet it is, in some years, 
almost common during the autumn as an immigrant from Continental 
Europe, and tarries for a considerable time with us. 
The object of these criticisms is to call attention to the fact that the status 
of these species in Scotland is not sufficiently well known to ornithologists ; 
and to suggest that original information on their distribution in some cases, 
and the details of their occurrence in others, may be usefully made known, to 
the advantage of British ornithology, through the pages of our Journal. 
W^iLLiAM Eagle Clarke. 
Woodcocks in Sutherland. —An unusually large flight of Wood- 
cocks seems to have arrived in Sutherland this year. On our shooting in the 
centre of the county, when, for the previous fifteen or sixteen years only some 
half-dozen had been killed in all that time, this year seven and twenty were 
obtained and a good many more seen. On the whole shooting of some forty 
or fifty thousand acres there are not a dozen trees, with the exception of per- 
haps a quarter of an acre just round the lodge. The birds seem to prefer 
rocky and broken ground with long heather, and, if in such situations there are 
patches of wettish, natural grass, so much the better, as these indicate good 
soil, and consequently good feeding. At the same time it is by no means 
necessary that the two classes of ground should be close together, but Wood- 
cocks will not be found near their feeding grounds in ordinary weather, 
unless there is good cover for them to lie in during the day. 
On the east coast of the county, Woodcocks are very fond of lying in patches 
of bracken mingled with stones and rocks, more especially if the weather be 
frosty, the harder the frost the better for the sportsman, as thus the more in- 
land situations get frozen up, and the birds are forced to come to warmer and 
more accessible places, and are then more collected. Snow is a still quicker 
agent in driving these birds in, as their feeding and resting grounds are' then 
covered, and they take themselves either to the woods, or to the whin and 
broom bushes so abundant on the coast. 
