J 02 
COMMON SHEILDRAKE. 
with brushwood, but intersected with bays ; and by 
the mouths of rivers we have seen them coming 
from their inland breeding places over extensive 
woods, skimming with a low flight just above the 
trees. It breeds in the holes and crevices of rocks, 
and when near a warren, selects the rabbit burrows. 
When the young are hatched, they are conducted 
to the sea, and Mr. Selby states, are sometimes car • 
ried in the bill of the parents to their protecting 
element. If come upon when the young are newly 
hatched, the old birds endeavour to lead off the in- 
truder by feigning lameness like some of the rasores 
and grallatores ; but when they have reached a more 
advanced state, unless a dog is present, they almost 
invariably fly straight away. When half fledged, 
however, they are seldom found far from water, 
though we have once or twice come upon them on 
the flat sands of the Solway, more than half-a-mile 
from the sea or any stream ; but notwithstanding, a 
single specimen was all that could be obtained, from 
the brood scattering, and making use of every little 
pool as a cover by diving, which in an extremity of 
this kind they do most actively. We have usually 
found the sheildrakes arriving about their breeding 
grounds in the beginning of March ; and where land 
had been embanked from the sea, have seen them 
early in the morning frequenting the fallow or newly 
sown grounds. After the young have been fully 
fledged, they appear to koop to the open sea, and we 
have seldom then seen them on land, and neither 
have we seen them on the coasts after September.- 
