Page:The Natural History of Ireland vol1.djvu/150

 period of the year, and frequently in winter. Within the first fort- night of December, 1832, I heard it sing on the mornings of five different days ; and on the 7th of the ensuing month two were heard at the same time. Under December the 2nd, 1838, it was noted at the Falls, that during the preceding eight days there had been most severe gales from the east and west, through the stormiest period of winch — chiefly in the morning — this bird was heard singing, as is its habit during storms in the spring. On the 26th of December, 1845, it was heard singing at the Palls for the first time that season.

As soon as the breeding season is over, these birds assemble either in families or large flocks — generally unassociated with other species — and are very destructive to the fruit in certain gardens and orchards about Belfast. On the 5th of July, I once saw two or three families congregated ; and on the 1st of August, 1832, fifty -four were reckoned in a flock in the garden at the Palls, where, during the month, they consumed almost the entire crop of raspberries. Several of the young birds were caught in rat-traps baited with this fruit. At the end of August the same year, they resorted in such numbers to an orchard, containing the most venerable fruit-trees in the vicinity of the town, that on one morning twenty-six, and on the next, seventeen of them were shot, and, with one or two exceptions, singly : late cherries were the attraction. Missel-thrushes were that year more than usually abundant. In 1833, the report of the gardener at the Palls was not, however, very satisfactory ; — that since they had eaten the greater part of the raspberries, and had cleared the trees of the late crop of cherries, he had not seen many. In the months of July and August in 1837 and 1838, but especially in the latter year, they were likewise most destructive to the raspberries here, and appeared in flocks consisting of forty or fifty individuals at a time. The injury was not confined^ to the mere loss of the fruit, but was increased by their weight breaking off the shoots on which it grew. Scarecrows attired after the fashion of men, and a rattle, such as is erected in fields of grain to frighten off feathered depre- dators, were used against them with some effect. I have been