110 BIRDS OF DUMFRIESSHIRE 
but a conspicuous immigration takes place in autumn, 
and is followed by an emigration in early spring, at the 
same time as those birds, which will breed with us, are dis- 
tributing themselves for nesting-purposes throughout the 
county. 
THE CHOUGH. Pyrrhocorax graculus (Linnaeus). 
Formerly a very rare accidental visitor. 
The Chough was at no time common within the limits of 
our county, though in the days when it nested freely in the 
sea- cliffs of Kirkcudbrightshire and Wigtownshire it may 
have occurred occasionally. 
As an inhabitant of inland localities it is but rarely 
known, and Mr. R. Service states : "I have not been able 
to authenticate two or three instances known to me, except 
in the case of a pair which took up their abode on an 
old ruined building at Bogrie in 1848. These were seen 
by Mr. Hastings, taxidermist, Dumfries, and others, and 
although the birds were evidently preparing for nesting, 
they mysteriously disappeared after frequenting the place 
for several months."* Bogrie in Dunscore parish is about 
twenty miles in a direct line from the nearest sea-cHffs. 
" The only ' Solway ' Chough," writes H. A. Macpherson, 
" that we know T. C. Hey sham to have seen, came under 
his notice in the Carlisle market, November 20th, 1849. 
This he ascertained to have been taken in the neighbourhood 
of Dumfries."! It is quite possible that William Hastings, 
who gave Mr. R. Service the information about the Choughs 
at Bogrie, may have forgotten the exact dates ; and if so, 
the record of T. C. Heysham may explain their mysterious 
disappearance. 
* Trans. Nat. Hist. Soc. Glasg., 1885, Vol. I., p. 120. 
t Fauna of Lakeland, 1892, pp. 152, 153. 
