THE WOODCOCK. 
245 
terly wind is said to drive the birds from the other side of the island 
to the eastern on account of better shelter, thoug’h there is very good 
about Islay House, — deficient, however, in the bottom or low cover 
which woodcocks like. I was struck with the correctness of the pre- 
ceding remark on the 15 th of January, when, although the weather 
for the previous ten days had been excessively wet, a considerable 
number of cocks were seen in the covers ; the wind being westerly. It 
changed to south-east in the afternoon, and though not blowing nor 
raining, the same covers, on being beaten next day, did not contain 
more than one for ten birds of the day before. A herd, on the moun- 
tain above the covers, saw four or five in company at twilight on the 
15th fiying in a westerly direction. Snow and frost on the mainland 
of Scotland have always been remarked to drive woodcocks in numbers 
to Islay. The keeper has never met with them in quantity after arri- 
val from higher latitudes, but has seen them so in spring when about 
leaving for the north. He imagined this increase to come from the 
mainland of Scotland ; but is it not more probably from Ireland ? The, 
earliest seen by him in autumn appeared at the end of September,* 
and the latest in spring, early in April, except in one season, the sum- 
mer of 1844, when a few remained.! At the beginning of August, 
eight were flushed together, and believed to be parents with their two 
broods. One or two had oecasionally been seen on their twilight flight 
during that summer. Woodcocks are considered here to leave the 
covers during the ordinary period of their stay, for the heaths, in open 
weather, as they cannot bear the drip of the trees during long-con- 
tinued rain. 
Woodcock shooting, one of the most “ exhilarating ” of sports, was 
enjoyed in perfection at Islay, during the few days that the ground 
was crisped by frost, — the pleasantest of all times for exereise indepen- 
dently of the satisfaction of being able to walk throughout the day 
without wetting the feet. In this shooting there were attractions here 
* In beating the extensive plantations at Dunskey, near Portpatrick, Scotland, 
on the 21st October, 1844, for pheasants and other game, we saw one woodcock, 
the first met with there that season. On the 26th, six brace were seen ; from which 
time they continued to increase, and were met with during the winter, as many 
being in the plantations in mid- winter as at the migratory periods : sixty brace were 
killed by occasional shooting. 
t P. Mackenzie, when keeper at Wynyard Park, Durham, once killed five wood- 
cocks on the 2nd of April, which was more than had ever before been killed there on 
one day. 
