All Biglils Reserved. May, 1912. 
BIRD NOTES: 
THE 
JOURNAL OF THE FOREIGN BIRD CLUB. 
Bird Life through the Camera. 
By H. Willford. 
{Continued from page 92). 
TPIE MEADOW PIPIT {Anthus pratensis), and CUCKOO 
(Cuculus canorus) . 
Tlie Meadow Pipit, like the Skylark— another ground- 
nester — is a bird which is met with all over the country and 
annually brings into existence, or rather helps to, more young 
Cuckoos than any other of the feathered tribe. They start nest- 
ing about April choosing some rough meadow or furze and 
bracken covered common, and often nest as late as August. 
The nest does not consist of much material, chiefly fine bents of 
grass and hair, neatly constructed under a sheltering tuft of 
coarser grass, also often placed in the shade of a clump of 
bracken, and so closely does the hen sit that one may pass the 
nest within an inch or two and she will refuse to move. 
The eggs are from four to six in number, of a brown- 
ish grey colour, and of a very mottled appearance. 
The young are fed on small flies, grubs, etc., and the 
parents when bringing food to their offspring follow the same 
procedure as the Skylark, by pitching some distance from 
the nest to which they stealthily creep, stopping to utter a faint 
song to let the young know food is near. 
In 1911 I found a nest containing a Cuckoo's and four 
Pipit's eggs; when they were about due to hatch I kept a 
fairly close watch. The Pipits were hatched first, some twenty 
four hours before the Cuckoo, but, within two days the 
young Cuckoo had started to eject the other inmates of the 
nest, and, I was lucky to pay the nest a visit at the criti- 
cal moment— two had already been thrown out and the Cuckoo 
was busily engaged in removing number three by working 
it on to his back, and having succeeded so far, raised 
