88 
XL 
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 
On the pellets thrown up by Kooks. — The fact that hawks 
and owls, indeed, all members of the raptorial order, — havmg no 
true gizzard, throw up, in the form of pellets, the indigestible 
portions of their food, is well known ; but that this system is 
adopted by the rook (and I have reason to believe by the jackdaw 
as well) will probably be received by our members as a new light, 
in the economy of so familiar a species. 
When at Cromer, during the months of July and August, 1870, 
my attention was first drawn to this point by Mr. H. H. Upcher, 
who brought me from Sherringham several large, light- coloured 
pellets, which he had jiicked up on the cliffs in that neighbourhood, 
and which consisted, chiefly, of the husks of barley upon which 
the rooks had recently been committing much dejjredation. 
Naturally supposing that if these pellets were really ejected by 
rooks, the habit would by no means be confined to the birds of 
one locality, I searched the margins of the lighthouse cliffs, at 
Cromer, and there found dozens of them, always within ten yards 
of the edge of the cliff, and in such spots as I had seen daily 
frequented by rooks in some numbers. 'J'he largest quantitj^ lay 
within tAVO or three hundred yards of a barley field, on the 
Northrepps estate, and the feathers, both large and small, strewed 
about Avherever pellets Avere visible, identified the rooks satisfactorily 
Avith these post-prandial deposits. The bu’ds evidently, after a 
hearty meal of grain, retired to the smooth soft turf on the edge 
of the cliffs, and there lazily digested their food, other excreta 
invariably lying in juxta-position ; Avhilst their leisure moments 
Avere devoted to the toilet, as shown by the featliers stroAvn around, 
and Avhich, from the moulting condition of tlie birds, had been 
preened pretty freely from all parts of their plumage. Besides the 
