242 
ST. ALBANS AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
nesting of that species near St. Albans. There are only four 
records for the whole county. 
(4) Winter Visitors .—These birds, as a rule, come into the 
district from more northerly haunts for the winter season, and 
disappear again with the return of more genial weather in spring. 
They include the redwing, fieldfare, grey wagtail, meadow-pipit, 
siskin, brambling, lesser redpoll, hpoded crow, water-rail, golden 
plover, woodcock, and common snipe. 
Of these it may be remarked that the lesser redpoll seems 
to be extending its summer range southwards, nests having been 
found of recent years in several of the Home Counties. It is 
reported, indeed, that a nest was found at Sopwell in 1898, 
and a local observer saw a pair of redpolls at the same place 
in July, 1909. It is probable that the meadow-pipit nests 
occasionally in the district, as may also, very exceptionally, the 
woodcock and the common snipe. 
The hooded or grey crow and the golden plover are regularly 
seen every winter—the latter in large flocks—in the east of the 
county, and they are reported in much smaller numbers almost 
every year from the St. Albans district. Further west in the 
county (save perhaps at Tring) they are almost unknown, so 
that apparently the St. Albans district forms the western limit 
of their annual distribution in Hertfordshire. 
(5) Casual and Irregular Visitors .—In this class are included 
(a) birds which, like the waxwing, the crossbill, and the sand- 
grouse, occur irruptively, in greater or smaller numbers, and at 
irregular intervals; and (b) birds of which only occasional 
stragglers are seen and recorded. In either case such exceptional 
visitors are mostly shot down as “ rare birds,” though in not 
a few cases they have been killed by flying against the telegraph 
wires. The following have been recorded:—Gulden oriole 
(1899), great grey shrike (1879 and 1901), waxwing (1895), 
mealy redpoll (a pair caught in the winter of 1881, the only 
record for the county), crossbill (large flocks, 1879, 1909, and 
1910), snow-bunting (1883), chough (May, 1884, the only 
record for the county), raven (1881), woodlark (1878-79), 
short-eared owl (1877), common buzzard (1881 and 1900), 
peregrine falcon (two occurrences, dates uncertain), cormorant 
(1885), gannet (1884), purple heron (1903, the only record for 
the county), bittern (date uncertain), wild goose (“ nearly 100 
wild geese,” species unknown, seen March, 1895), goosander 
(1890), Pallas’ sand-grouse (seven seen near Batch Wood, May, 
1888), spotted crake (1880 and 1910), ringed plover (1884), 
dunlin (1890), sanderling (1893), redshank (1891), black tern 
(1886), common gull (1880), herring gull (1881), kittiwake 
(1884), little auk (1885 and 1910), puffin (1894), and storm 
petrel (1886). 
The raven doubtless formerly nested in Hertfordshire, and the 
bittern is known to have done so on one occasion. But perhaps 
the “ most misplaced ” bird in this list is the woodlark which 
