Part 7

It is annually observed in Malta in spring and autumn, but never found there during the winter months (Wright, “Ibis,” 1864, p. 61). Lieut. Sperling, however, believes that it is not uncommon on the north coast of the Mediterranean in winter. South of the habitat assigned to it, this bird ranges through Abyssinia (whence I have seen a specimen in the collection of African birds belonging to Mr. Sharpe) to Mozambique, where, according to Lieut. Sperling, it is plentiful in winter; and Mr. Layard has included it amongst the birds of South Africa, having received specimens from Windvogelberg and the Knysna. It has a West African representative in _Anthus Gouldii_ of Frazer (Hartlaub, “Orn. West Afr.,” p. 73), which differs in its smaller size and darker colour, and in having the head of a uniform dull brown, instead of being streaked.

THE PENNSYLVANIAN PIPIT. (_Anthus ludovicianus._)

On the authority of several good naturalists this species is stated to have occurred several times in the British Islands; but the general description of the specimens referred to applies as a rule so well to the _Anthus spinoletta_ above mentioned, that it is extremely difficult to say to which of the two species they belonged. It is of course far more probable that the visitors to our shores would be of European, not American, extraction. At the same time they have been described as according so well in every respect with the American _ludovicianus_, that we must either admit that the latter bird occasionally visits this country, or agree with Richardson and Swainson (“Faun. Bor. Americana,” ii. p. 231) that it is indistinguishable from _aquaticus_ of Bechstein, that is, _spinoletta_ of Linnæus.

Edwards was the first to notice this bird as a visitant to England, giving a description and figure of a specimen obtained near London in his “Gleanings” (vol. ii. p. 185, pl. 297). Montagu shortly afterwards noticed two in his “Ornithological Dictionary,” one of which had been taken in Middlesex, the other near Woolwich.

Macgillivray, in his “Manual of British Birds,” p. 169, minutely describes two Pipits which were shot near Edinburgh in June, 1824, and which he identifies clearly with the American species.

Mr. Turnbull, in his “Birds of East Lothian,” states (p. 40) that three Pennsylvanian Pipits were shot at Dunbar in East Lothian by Mr. Robert Gray, of Glasgow.

Mr. Bond has a Pipit, identified as belonging to this species, which was obtained at Freshwater, in the Isle of Wight, in September, 1865; while the most recent instance of the occurrence of this Pipit in England will be found in the “Zoologist” for 1870. But anyone who reads the correspondence relating to this instance (“Zool.” tom. cit. pp. 2021, 2067, and 2100) will see how difficult it is to identify a species when the specimen is not in fully adult plumage.

When it is remembered that _Anthus ludovicianus_, as stated by Professor Reinhardt (“Ibis,” 1861, p. 3), breeds in Greenland, and, according to Professor Blasius, is found in Heligoland (“Naumannia,” 1858), it is certainly not improbable that it should occasionally be found in the British Islands. At the same time it is very desirable that some more convincing evidence than that which already exists of its occurrence here should be placed upon record.

THE RED-THROATED PIPIT. (_Anthus cervinus._)

The present bird has, as yet, been scarcely admitted into the British list. I have seen a specimen in the collection of Mr. Bond, which was killed at Unst, Shetland, on the 4th May, 1854, and about the same year, but in September, another in the same collection was shot at Freshwater in the Isle of Wight.

In the adult plumage the species is easily recognized by the ruddy brown colouring of the upper portions of the plumage, and by the rufous patch upon the throat.

In size it is equal to the Meadow Pipit, and by some naturalists it has been considered a permanent race or variety of that species; but the observations of Prof. Newton on this point[50] certainly tend to show that the species is a valid one. It was met with by him in June, 1855, when in company with Messrs. Wolley and Simpson, in a restricted locality in East Finmark, between Wadsö and Nyborg, and several well-identified nests were procured. A specimen procured in Heligoland is in Herr Gätke’s collection.

It is not uncommon as a winter visitant in Turkey, and Mr. Wright has shot many specimens in Malta, where he says it arrives in small flocks in spring and autumn. In Egypt and Nubia this bird quite takes the place of _A. pratensis_, and is sometimes very common there. It probably winters also in Palestine, although Canon Tristram, during his sojourn there at that season, only met with a single specimen on the coast of the plain of Sharon. It has been found in China, Japan, Formosa, and Hainan, by Mr. Swinhoe, who suggests that this bird in its winter plumage is the _Anthus japonicus_ of Temminck and Schlegel. Mr. Blyth thinks that it should probably be erased from the Indian list, as the ordinary Himalayan species, _A. rosaceus_ of Hodgson, has been confounded with it. Upon this point, however, much difference of opinion prevails. Dr. Jerdon, in his “Birds of India,” gives _rosaceus_ as a synonym of _cervinus_, and Mr. Hume is puzzled to distinguish _rosaceus_ from _arboreus_. He says (“Ibis,” 1870, p. 288): “Typical examples of both species seem unmistakably distinct, but intermediate forms of the most puzzling character occur, of such a nature that it really seems to me impossible to decide to which species they ought to be referred.”

Professor Newton considers that the Red-throated Pipit is as yet scarcely entitled to a place in the list of British Birds; nevertheless it is a bird, as he says, whose migratory habits and wide north-eastern range make it very likely to occur in this country, and probably its recognition as an occasional visitor to the British Islands is only a matter of time and observation.

THE SPOTTED FLYCATCHER. (_Muscicapa grisola._)

The family of Flycatchers is a very large one, having representatives in all parts of the globe; but in the British Islands two species only can with propriety be included in the list of annual summer migrants. It is true that at least one other species has been met with in this country, to which allusion will be made presently; but it cannot be regarded in any other light than that of a rare and accidental visitant.

The Spotted Flycatcher (_Muscicapa grisola_), as remarked by the eminent Irish naturalist, Thompson, is probably little known, except to the observant ornithologist. Owing to the dulness of its plumage, its want of song, and its weak call being seldom heard, it is certainly one of the least obtrusive of our birds; the trees, too, having put forth their “leafy honours” before the period of its arrival, further serve to screen it from observation. It is one of the latest of our summer migrants to arrive, seldom appearing before the second week in May, and generally taking its departure during the first week of September. It is found throughout the British Islands, but is much less common in Scotland. It has, however, been found breeding as far north as Sutherland and Caithness. The situation selected by this bird for its abode during its stay with us is generally in the neighbourhood of gardens and orchards, where it takes up its quarters on a wall or fruit tree, and sallies forth into the air after passing insects. The name of Spotted Flycatcher is more appropriately bestowed upon the bird in its immature plumage, when each brown feather is tipped with a buff spot. As it grows older, these spots gradually disappear. It is a wonderfully silent bird, and even when the hen is sitting the male does not, like the males of so many other species, pour forth a song to enliven her. The nest is usually placed on a beam in a shed, in a hole in a wall, or on the branch of a wall-fruit tree, partially supported by the wall; not unfrequently it may be discovered in a summer-house. It is neatly composed of moss and fine roots, and lined with grass, horsehair, and feathers. The eggs, generally five in number, are bluish white, spotted, chiefly at the large end, with reddish brown.

The late Mr. Wheelwright found the Spotted Flycatcher inhabiting Lapland in summer, but observed that it was not nearly so common there at that season as the Pied Flycatcher. In Central and Southern Europe it is a summer resident, passing through Spain and Portugal, Italy, Turkey, and the Ionian Islands twice a year—namely, in spring and autumn. Its course in autumn appears to be south-east by south. Mr. Wright has noticed it as very common in spring and autumn in Malta, arriving there somewhat later than the Pied Flycatcher. It has been noticed by Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., as plentiful in Algeria in summer. Captain Shelley met with it once at Alexandria in May, when it was probably migrating; and Rüppell includes it without hesitation amongst the birds of North Africa.[51] In the middle of October, Von Heuglin found that it was not rare near Tadjura, and somewhat later in the year on the Somali coast. In Palestine Canon Tristram found it breeding in all parts of the country, its favourite nesting-places being in the branches of old gnarled trees overhanging the paths (“Ibis,” 1867, p. 361). How far eastward it extends I am not sure, as in China and Japan an allied species appears to take its place. But south of the Mediterranean it penetrates to South Africa. Mr. Layard says,[52] “the common European flycatcher has been brought by Mr. Andersson from Damara Land in some abundance. And Andersson himself states[53] that the bird is common in Damara and Great Namaqua Land, and is found there throughout the year. Dr. Hartlaub cites it on M. Verreaux’s authority as from the Cape, and Swainson also alludes to it as from South Africa. Since the publication of the work above quoted, Mr. Layard has been enabled to add that his son procured this bird at Grootevadersbosch, near Swellendam. From Lapland, then, to the Cape of Good Hope, and from Portugal to Palestine is a pretty extensive range for so small and weak a bird as our Common Flycatcher. I should not be surprised to hear that it is found even still further to the eastward, for so many of our summer migratory birds spend their winter in India and China, and after all the greater part of their journey would be by overland route, which admits of their travelling by stages, to rest and feed by the way.

THE PIED FLYCATCHER. (_Muscicapa atricapilla._)

From its conspicuous black and white plumage, the Pied Flycatcher is a much more attractive species than the commoner bird. Strange to say, although of similar habits, and living on similar food, it is by no means so common as a species, nor so generally dispersed. Its presence in Scotland is always looked upon as an uncommon occurrence, and in Ireland, until recently, it was quite unknown.

During the month of April, 1875, Mr. Robert Warren, jun., of Moyview, Ballina, co. Mayo, met with this bird for the first time in his neighbourhood, and the following communication from him on the subject was published in the natural history columns of “The Field,” on the 1st of May, 1875:—“It may interest some of your ornithological readers to learn that a Pied Flycatcher (_Muscicapa atricapilla_) visited this extreme western locality on the 18th of April. My attention was first attracted by seeing it catching insects in the true flycatcher style; but, thinking it rather strange that our common Spotted Flycatcher should appear a month or six weeks earlier than usual, I watched it attentively for some time. It then struck me as having a smaller head and closer plumage than the spotted one, and occasionally I thought I observed some white marks on the wings; but, the evening light just fading, I could not be quite certain of the white marks. Although knowing it to be a flycatcher, I was not satisfied as to its identity, so next morning I returned to that part of my lawn where I had seen it the night before, and again saw it hard at work; but now having better light, and the aid of a field glass, I was not long in making out quite distinctly the white wing marks, which showed me that it was not the common _Muscicapa grisola_. I took my gun and secured what I believe to be the first specimen of _Muscicapa atricapilla_ ever shot in Ireland. Neither Thompson in his ‘Birds of Ireland,’ nor Professor Newton in his new edition of ‘Yarrell’s British Birds,’ mentions it as a visitor to Ireland, or gives any record of its capture in this island; and Mr. Harting, in his ‘Handbook of British Birds,’ p. 10, says it is unknown in Ireland. The specimen, an adult female, is now in the collection of the Royal Dublin Society.”

To this communication the editor appended the following note:—“Although we always regret to hear of the wanton destruction of a rare bird, we must admit that circumstances sometimes occur to justify an individual capture, and we think the present instance is a case in point. By the actual possession of the bird seen, Mr. Warren has been enabled to establish beyond doubt the fact of the occurrence in Ireland of a species previously unknown there, and has thus a complete answer to any sceptic who might suggest that he may have been mistaken in his identification of it.”

In England the Pied Flycatcher is a regular summer migrant, quite as much as any other of the small birds already noticed. Mr. A. G. More, in his “Notes on the Distribution of Birds in Great Britain during the Nesting Season,” regards it as a very local species, and observes that the nest has occasionally been found in North Devon, Somerset, Dorset, Isle of Wight, Surrey, Oxford, Norfolk, Gloucester, Shropshire, Leicester, and Derby. To these counties I may add Middlesex (for I have known several instances of this bird nesting as near London as at Hampstead, Highgate, and Harrow) and Essex, where the species has been met with at Leytonstone. Yarrell adds Sussex, Suffolk, Yorkshire (where I also have seen it), Worcester, Lancashire, Derbyshire, Cumberland, Westmoreland, Northumberland, and Durham, and on the southern coast, Hampshire. He makes no mention of its occurrence in Wales, neither does Mr. A. G. More in his essay above mentioned. During the summer of 1871, however, several letters appeared in the natural history columns of “The Field,” communicating the fact of its nesting in Breconshire, Denbighshire, and Merionethshire.[54] The sites selected for the nests are usually holes in walls, ruins, and pollard trees, and the nest itself is composed of roots, grass, strips of inside bark and horsehair. The eggs, five or six in number, are of a very pale blue colour, much paler, smaller, and rounder than those of the hedge sparrow. A correspondent who has taken several nests of this bird states that he never found one containing feathers; but I think I have seen one lined with feathers which had been taken out of an old birch tree in Lapland by the late Mr. H. Wheelwright. In this lamented naturalist’s entertaining book, “A Spring and Summer in Lapland,” he states that, although he never met with the Pied Flycatcher on the fells, it was to be found as far north as the birch region extends, and he generally found the nest in small dead birch stubbs by the riverside. Messrs. Godman met with it some way up the mountains to the north of Bodö in Norway, where the birch was also the favourite nesting tree. As it is common in most parts of Central and Southern Europe, and is found as far westward as Portugal, it is rather curious that Professor Savi should have so long overlooked its occurrence in Tuscany. Dr. Giglioli noticed it as abundant at Pisa in April, and, on recording it as new to the Tuscan avifauna, he added (“Ibis,” 1865, p. 56): “When I showed the numerous specimens I had procured to Professor Savi, he was much surprised, and said that, during the forty years he had been studying the ornis of this part of Italy, he had never come across the Pied Flycatcher, which, however, abounds during the spring passage at Genoa, and all along the Riviera.” It is a spring and autumn visitor in Malta; but, though often seen in the valleys and by roadsides in the neighbourhood of trees, it is not so numerous in the island as _M. grisola_. Mr. O. Salvin found the Pied Flycatcher not uncommon about Souk Harras in the Eastern Atlas, and Mr. Tyrrwhitt Drake saw it during the spring migration in Tangier and Eastern Morocco. A specimen from the River Gambia is in the collection of Mr. R. B. Sharpe. Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., during a recent tour in Algeria, encountered this amongst other familiar birds. He says (“Ibis,” 1871, p. 76): “It was not until April that I saw this species, after which it became common. In the dayats and in the Gardaia, where they most abounded, the proportion of adult males in full summer plumage to young birds and females was as one to five. They looked exceedingly picturesque in the rich foliage of the oases, clinging perhaps to a rough palm stem, though their more usual perch was the upper bough of a bush, whence they would dart off after passing flies.” To this I may add that the note frequently repeated is not unlike that of the Redstart, although softer and more agreeable, and the bird when uttering it often shuffles its wings after the manner of a Hedge Sparrow. Canon Tristram found this bird to be a summer resident in Palestine, and first noticed it in Galilee on April 23rd; but, though remaining to breed, he considered it rather a scarce bird there.

An allied species, _Muscicapa albicollis_, is generally distributed over the South of Europe, Palestine, and North Africa, which differs from the Pied Flycatcher in having the nape of the neck white instead of black; in other words, the white of the throat extends entirely round the neck. It is found in Greece, Turkey, Tuscany, Spain, Portugal, and France, less commonly in the north of France, and not in Belgium or Holland. It is singular, considering that the two species occupy the same haunts during a great portion of the year, that the White-necked Flycatcher never accompanies its more sable congener to England; yet, so far as I am aware, there is no instance of its occurrence here on record.

What is the cause which operates to restrain one species from migrating, when a closely allied bird of similar habits is impelled to take a long and perilous journey? Truly it is a curious question.

Before taking leave of our British flycatchers, it may be observed that a third species, the Red-breasted Flycatcher (_Muscicapa parva_), a native of South-eastern Europe and Western Asia, has been met with and procured on three separate occasions in Cornwall. One was taken at Constantine, near Falmouth, on Jan. 24, 1863.[55] A second was captured at Scilly in October of the same year;[56] and a third was procured also at Scilly on Nov. 5, 1865.[57] All the specimens procured were immature. The adult bird has a breast like a robin, which renders it a particularly attractive species. It is said to be not uncommon in the Crimea and in Hungary, extending eastward to Western and North-western India, where it is plentiful,[58] and is found accidentally in Italy, Switzerland, and France. Mr. Howard Saunders has reason to believe that it has been met with in Southern Spain in winter, but Col. Irby is somewhat sceptical on the point.[59]

In Sir Oswald Mosely’s “Natural History of Tutbury” (p. 385), it is reported that a pair of the North American Red-eyed Flycatcher (_Muscicapa olivacea_) appeared at Chellaston, near Derby, in May, 1859, and one of them was shot. If there was no mistake in the identification of the species, one can only suppose that the birds must have been brought over to this country in a cage, and contrived to effect their escape.

THE SWALLOW. (_Hirundo rustica._)

Few birds have attracted more attention in all countries and in all ages than the Swallows; and the habits of those species which annually visit the British Islands have been so thoroughly investigated and so frequently described, that little originality can be claimed for the remarks which I have now to offer.

There are two points, however, in the natural history of these birds which do not appear to have received from their biographers so much attention as they deserve, viz., the nature of their food, and their geographical distribution. I have repeatedly been asked, “What do Swallows feed upon?” and “Where do Swallows go in winter?” To these two questions I will now endeavour to reply, believing that an exposition of such facts as have been ascertained on these points will be more acceptable to the reader than a repetition of what has been so frequently published on the subject of habits, haunts, dates of arrival, and other minor details.