DIPPER . — Hydrobates cinclus. 
The Ant Threshes find an English representative in the well-known Dipper, 
or Water-Ousel, of onr river-banks. 
Without brilliant plumage or graceful shape, it is yet one of the most 
interesting of British birds, when watched in its favourite haunts. It always 
frequents rapid streams and channels, and, being a very shy and retiring bird, 
prefers those spots where the banks overhang the water, and are clothed with 
brushwood. Should the bed of the stream be broken up with rocks or large 
stones, and the fall be sufficiently sharp to wear away an occasional pool, the 
Dipper is all the better pleased with its home, and in such a locality may 
generally be found by a patient observer. 
All the movements of this little bird are quick, jerking, and wren-like, and it is 
continually flirting its apology for a tail. Caring nothing for the frost of winter, 
so long as the water remains free from ice, the Dipper may be seen throughout 
the winter months, flitting from stone to stone with the most animated gestures, 
occasionally stopping to pick up some morsel of food, and ever and anon taking 
to the water, where it sometimes dives entirely out of sight, and at others merely 
walks into the shallows, and there flaps about with great rapidity. 
The food of the Dipper seems to be exclusively of an animal character, and, in 
the various specimens which have been examined, consists of insects, small 
crust ace ae, and the spawn and fry of various fishes. 
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