214 WOODCOCK 
occasional in Cumberland and Lancashire. It has been a 
few times reported from Orkney and Shetland and the 
Outer Hebrides. It is a species breeding in the far North, 
of pretty regular occurrence in Britain as a passing migrant. 
SCOLOPAX RUSTICULA, Linn. 
WOODCOCK. 
Manx, Ushag rhennee=fern bird. 
Woodcock are mentioned by John Christian, Vicar of 
Marown’ in 1776, as among the migratory birds of that 
parish. Townley (October 23, 1789) writes: ‘I have heard 
of the arrival of one woodcock, in this (Douglas) neighbour- 
hood’ In his list of 1888 Mr. Kermode notes that the 
Woodcock has occasionally been known to breed in Man; 
he does not. repeat this in his later account, and there is 
no evidence known to me, though it seems not unlikely, 
Mr, Kermode mentions one shot by Mr. W. Kermode, Peel, 
on 12th May 1890. 
Woodcocks arrive usually in October (Mr. Kermode’s 
earliest date is 13th), and leave in March. Mr. Crellin, 
however, heard of two at Sulby (one of which was shot) on 
12th September 1896, and another was found dead at 
Milntown (according to the same observer, on 8th August 
1903), while Mr. H. S. Clarke saw one near Sulby on 
14th September in the same year, and yet another was — 
picked up on the railway line near the same village on 
19th September; these being doubtless British bred birds, 
and those of 8th August and 19th September probably 
killed by contact with telegraph wires. Mr, Allison, also, 
tells me that he has seen a Woodcock in July. | 
1 MS. in possession of Mr. A. W. Moore, Y. Z. IL, ii. 29. 
