WRYNECK 
YUNX TORQUILLA. 
The Wryneck is only a summer visitor to the British Islands, arriving early in April, and, after rearing its 
young, leaving our shores about the end of August or early in September. The latest date on which I have 
noticed one was on the 5th of September ; this was within a few hundred yards of the sea-coast. In most 
of the southern and eastern counties a few pairs are to be met with scattered over the wooded portions 
of the country, though in no locality I am acquainted with can it be termed abundant. Ou a fine spring 
morning during the second week in April, I have on one or two occasions in Sussex met with as many as half a 
dozen specimens within a short distance of one another, along a hedgerow, on a rough grassy bank. These, 
however, were birds that had just landed, and were taking their first rest after making the passage of the 
Channel. On visiting the spot a few hours later it would be found that the whole of them had shifted their 
quarters further inland. I can find no entry in my note-books concerning observations on this species further 
north than Norfolk ; and I am unable to call to mind a single instance where I have recognized it in either the 
more northern counties of England or the south of Scotland. 
Owing to the sober tints of its beautifully marked and variegated plumage, this is by no means an 
attractive species, and, except on its first arrival (when its subdued though somewhat striking note is heard), 
it might easily escape the observation of those who are not accustomed to its habits or actions. The cry 
somewhat resembles the words “ peu, peu, peu,” repeated six, eight, ten, or even a dozen times in rapid 
succession. 
The Wryneck, when unmolested, is most unsuspicious of danger, and is an exceedingly amusing visitor 
to watch while taking up its residence for the summer months in an orchard or shrubbery. Occasionally 
the young are reared in close proximity to dwelling-houses. A brood were pointed out to me some years 
back, near the small village of Plumpton, in Sussex, in a hole in an apple-tree standing at the distance of 
only three or four feet from the door of a cottage. The woman who lived there was particularly anxious I 
should make away with the family, as she declared they one and all “ bussed ” at her every time the door was 
opened ; and she had a notion they were “ unlucky birds.” This was the first and only time I have heard such 
an idea expressed with regard to this species. 
The remarkably elongated tongue of the Wryneck clearly indicates that it is intended by nature to procure 
its living in somewhat the same manner as the Woodpecker tribe. Ants and their eggs, together with insects 
of various kinds, form probably the chief or the whole of its diet. 
Wryneck, and Cuckoo’s mate, appear to be the commonest titles for this species. Any one who has 
quietly watched one of these birds sunning itself on the limb of a tree, and carefully noted all the 
contortions it will go through (elongating its neck and twisting it in the most extraordinary manner, 
while adding to the strangeness of its attitudes by occasionally raising and dropping its feathers so as 
to admit the warmth of the sun), will easily recognize the derivation of the name. The date of its arrival, 
