Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 3 (1899).djvu/148

124 places nothing was left but the ribs of the leaf by the thirsty game-birds. The turnips themselves suffered so much that there was not the requisite cover for Partridges, and beech trees had the appearance of being withered. Three Bearded Tits, driven from their usual asylum on the Broads, or wanderers from Holland, were seen on a pond near Holt, where I never remember any before; and three Egyptian Geese and some Canada Geese were moving about in the vicinity of Cromer, the latter probably from Gunton lake, where the young are seldom pinioned.

On the 31st House-Martins still had young not flown on the steepest part of Runton cliffs, and Mr. Patterson met with Sand-Martins' nests in a hole in the wall. I cannot say whether the drought had anything to do with the choice of such habitations, or with the fact that a Greater Spotted Woodpecker was hewing holes at Keswick as if it had been May. But much later than this there were Starlings' nests, with young in them, at Hellesdon and Keswick.

5th.—Shoveller at Hempstead.

16th.—A Norfolk Plover, with some Lapwings, close to the town of Yarmouth, where eight Spotted Redshanks have lately been shot (E. Saunders).

20th.—Two Ospreys at Filby Broad, the precision with which they caught fish being particularly noticed by the Rev. C.B. Lucas.

W. wind ten days, S. wind seven days, E. wind six days, N. wind four days.

Migration now set in with some earnest, and Kingfishers and Greater Spotted Woodpeckers were in evidence. One Woodpecker was among the Wells sand-hills (Col. Feilden), and I met with others alive, and in shops; but perhaps their migration was more marked higher up the east coast. From the observations of Mr. Boyes in 'The Field,' and Mr. Evans in the 'Scottish Naturalist,' Norfolk has not had so many Greater Spotted Woodpeckers since 1868, and that also was a great Crossbill year.

Lusciniola schwarzi was shot in Lincolnshire on the 1st, and three Dafila spinicauda in Suffolk, but the latter must have