74 BIRDS OF DUMFRIESSHIRE 
going will show that a more strict enforcement of the 
Wild Birds Protection Act is most necessary and would 
probably be most beneficial. 
THE SISKIN. Chrysomitris spinus (Linnaeus). 
An irregular winter-visitor ; as a nesting-species extremely local and 
scarce. 
Sir William Jardine writing in 1832 of the Siskin says 
that it " appears at uncertain intervals in very large 
flocks."* and again elsewhere : " In 1827 Annandale . . . 
was visited by large flocks, which did not again return, 
and where, since, they have only been partiaUy seen in 
smaU parties or pairs."t In 1839 he recorded that a few 
pairs had been known to breed near New Abbey m 
Galloway,} which, although outside our county, I give as 
contemporaneous with their nesting at Dalswmton (Kirk- 
mahoe). Here the birds used to breed annuaUy, and 
W G. Johnstone recorded that "In an old plantation, 
parish of Kirkmahoe, Dumfriesshire, I this year (AprU, 
1853) had the pleasure of discovering a Siskin s nest, 
containing one egg. The nest was close to the trunk ot a 
larch tree about eight feet from the ground, not particularly 
well concealed, and not remarkable for neatness ; it was 
composed of hypnum, hair, and fibrous roots (no feathers) 
rather firmly compacted. Near to the same spot last year 
a nest was taken containing young, the party who took 
them succeeded in rearing two of them. § In 1855 » 
nest containing young was again found in Dalswmton 
Wood, and by the assistance of the male bird they were 
* New Stat. Acct. Scot., Vol. IV., p. 179. 
t Nat. Lib., 1839, Vol. XI., p. 278. 
X Op. cit., 1839, Vol. XI., p. 278. 
§ Naturalist, 1854, Vol. IV., p. 51. 
