FOURTH SF.RIES. 
Some Notes on the Birds 
OF WHICU 
PHOTOGRAPHS APPEAR IN 
THE PRECEDING PAGES . . 
BY 
Peter Webster. 
Bullfinch (Page i8). — The bullfinch is a common bird in England, 
but in Scotland and Ireland it is not so plentiful — or at all events is 
local. Bird-catchers never miss a chance of caging a bullfinch, since 
it commands a good price and is one of the simplest birds to catch, 
bring at once attracted by the piping of the call-bird. It is a short 
plump bird with a very short thick beak. The adult male is very 
handsome, having a lovely velvety black head, wings and tail, while 
rump, grey shoulders, and brilliant red breast. The adult female and 
young of both sexes are not nearly so brightly coloured. The natural, 
low piping note of the bullfinch is rather monotonous, but it will pick 
up and whistle a tune very readily. 
The nest of the bullfinch can always be identified, being con. 
structed exclusively of .small twigs ingeniously woven together. It 
h.-is rather a flat appearance and is lined with fine roots and hair 
to receive the five blue eggs, blotched and speckled with violet 
and reddish-brown markings on the larger end. As a site for their 
nest, these birds appear to be very partial to small ornamental fir- 
trees planted in the centre of a lawn or flower-bed, or in a plantation. 
If the young birds are taken when half-grow-n and put into an open 
cage hung up cIo.se to the original home, the old birds will faithfully 
tend them, and in some ca.ses will even follow them when removed 
bodily to the nearest house and hung up on the wall. 
Chough (Page 19). — The scarcity of the chough is perhaps one of 
the most striking e.\amples at the present day of what will sooner or 
later happen to more of our rarer birds. When egg-collectors put a 
price of 5s. 6d., on each chough’s egg it is little wonder that their 
nests are systematically plundered. The haunts of this interesting 
bird have been considerably retluced in numbers during the last ten 
years, and it is now only to be found Iweeding in the most secluded 
places of oiirshore.s. The west coasts of Scotland and Ireland are the 
only places where any numbers are to be found. The chough is of a 
