BIRDS OF DUMFRIESSHIRE 
For the accompanying illustration I am indebted t 
kindness of Mr. R. Martin, who lent Mr. D. Legar. 
actual specimens described, in order that they migl 
photographed. 
THE CORN-BUNTING. EmberizamUiaria,liiimeeus. 
A fairly common «.ident in the littoral parishes, but very local eUewhere ; 
gathering into small flocks, increased by .mmigranU, m autumn. 
Sir WiUiam Jardine writing of the birds of Applegarth 
and Sibbaldbie in 1832, says that the Corn-Bunting is 
migratory, and is met with in autumn in small flocks and 
breeds in the lower pasture-land. It also is a bird of local 
distribution."* , 
It is somewhat strange that after so many years and so 
many changes, the present distribution «Ptf.'^t^^;;f^ 
be the same, so far as we know, as in the days of Sir Wilham 
Jardine. In autumn and winter this bird gathers into 
flocks which are sweUedby immigrants from further north 
and at this season it becomes more generally distributed 
throughout the arable districts, having been seen so tar 
afield as Wanlockhead. A flock of seventy or more was 
seen near Dumfries on December 12th, 1908.t 
The Corn-Bunting appears to nest but locally in the lower 
portions of Nithsdale, Annandale and Eskdale though more 
commonly in the littoral parishes ; and I have confident 
reports of its nesting on White Hill Farm (Kirkconnel) and 
in Sanquhar parish. ,^ , i , ;„ 
The late W. G. Hunter of Shearington (Caerlaverock) m 
his last contribution to the Dumfries and Galloway Gouner 
and HeraM (July 10th, 1907) writes as follows : One of the 
most familiar cries of the countryside m June is that of 
the Corn-Bunting. You cannot mistake him as he sits on 
the top of a hawthorn or other tree frmgmg a field of corn 
» New Stat. Acct. Scot., Vol. IV., p. 179. 
t Ann. Scot. Nat. Hist., 1909, p. 201. 
