STARLING. 
3 
ing 
on the broads four miles inland. TV liile steaming in company with the herring-fleet in the North Sea, duri 
the autumn of 1872, for the purpose of taking notes on Gulls and also watching the migration, large flocks of 
Staihngs ucrc encountered, making straight for the Norfolk and Suffolk coast, on many occasions between 
the /th of October and the 9th of November. The birds usually kept in compact bodies of from one to three 
or four hundred, flying strongly, witli few, if any, stragglers. I cannot call to mind an instance of noticing 
a single Starling that showed signs of fatigue. I can offer no opinion concerning the course followed by these 
migrants after reaching our coasts. During protracted winter storms Starlings in thousands may occasionally 
he observed making their way along the coast of Sussex from cast to west : at times numbers are passed 
at sea heading towards the west; but I have no personal knowledge of their attempting to cross the channel. 
Early in spring Starlings again return towards the cast coast. While on Hiekling Broad, on the 27tli 
of March, 1873, I noticed that immense flocks of Starlings continued flying east during the whole of the 
morning up till midday, the wind at the time being light and easterly. It is, however, evident that these 
birds cross the North Sea earlier in the season, as several in company with Larks were taken on board the 
‘ Ncwarp ’ and ‘Hasbro’’ light-ships during the last week in February, a couple also being secured on the 
‘Lynn Well’ previous to the 8th of March*. Throughout March numbers fell disabled on the floating lights 
off the east coast, the migration appearing to cease about the end of the month. 
The young Starling in his first feathers is clad in a particularly unpretending suit of sober grey. The 
more conspicuous plumage, which is assumed after the first moult, shows itself in somewhat irregular patches, 
rendering the appearance of the bird for a time exceedingly strange. 
But few varieties of this species have come under my observation ; the two I met with, however, were 
especially striking. “While watching a large flock passing the steamboat about twenty miles off Yarmouth, on 
the 7th of October, 1872, my attention was attracted by a bird entirely cream-coloured: the whole body 
were so close that I could not have been mistaken. On the 20th of October, 1883, a most singularly marked 
Starling was detected in a flock of some four or five hundred harbouring about the sheep at Buckingham, 
near Brighton : the feathers of the tail from the rump downwards were of a pure and spotless white, the 
rest of the plumage being of the ordinary type. I had ample opportunities for examining this specimen, 
which, on wing, somewhat resembled the Green Sandpiper, as at times it alighted on the back of a sheep, 
showing itself off to the fullest advantage. 
* Being surprised that Starlings were crossing the Xorth Sea so early as the end of February, I made further inquiries, and learned that t he 
birds were taken at the time stated. On this authority I have given the above information. 
