Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 1 (1877).djvu/307

Rh downwards, were almost white, and the back and wings apparently of a silvery gray, but I was not near enough to see whether the edges of the feathers were darker. It had the appearance of a young bird of the last year, the plumage of which had been bleached by the weather. Mr. Clogg mentions having seen a similar bird on the Cornish coast a month or two since.

Lesser Blackbacked Gulls were still about on April 28th, but most of the old breeding birds had left. On the 30th there were three young Ravens, almost as large as their parents, out of the nest at Bovisand, flying and hopping about on the summit of the cliff. To my knowledge, Ravens have nested in the same place for forty years. A Kestrel had its nest close to the Ravens, and others were found breeding all along the coast. Returning from Bovisand across the Sound, I heard and saw two Whimbrel, and remarked a pair of Razorbills in full summer plumage.

Whimbrels were numerous on the mud-banks of the River Lynher on May 2nd, and Whitethroats were plentiful in the hedgerows along the coast. A Swift was flying over Stonehouse on the 4th, and the first House Martins made their appearance in the neighbourhood on the same day; wind east, blowing very strong and cold. By the 7th the weather had become mild and warm, more Swifts were seen, and I observed Jackdaws circling in the air after insects, in the manner of Swallows and Starlings during still and warm weather—a habit I had not before noticed in these birds. I was also pleased to see several pairs of Water Ouzels on different parts of the River Erme: they doubtless had nests in the vicinity.

A few days after I visited a small heronry, consisting of six or seven nests, which has been formed within the last three or four years on some oak trees in Cheviock Wood, on the Cornish side of the Lynher, near St. Germains. It is most probably an offshoot from the old-established colony at Warleigh, by the side of the Tavy, a Devonshire stream, some miles distant, and although small is I think entitled to be added to the list of British heronries. The old birds left the trees and their nests long before I got near them, but on searching among the brushwood beneath I found a dead young one, in the down, which had evidently been blown out of the nest during a very heavy gale from the N.E. a short time 2