Page:VCH Rutland 1.djvu/91

 BIRDS THE list of Rutland birds is not a large one, and numbers little more than two hundred. This is not surprising, for the county is the smallest of all, in fact, less than half the size of any other excepting Middlesex, its circumference being only about fifty miles. Moreover it is an inland county, containing scarcely any waste lands or heaths and only 200 acres of water. Out of a total area of a little over 100,000 acres only 4,000 acres are covered with woodland, and orchards — which are paradises of bird life — account for no more than 150 acres. Rutland is pre-eminently the agricultural county of England, having fewer inhabitants per square mile than any other part of the country except Westmorland. This fact, so far as it goes, is no doubt favourable to certain forms of bird life. Game pre- serving, though of course practised here as elsewhere, is not carried to such extreme lengths, except perhaps in one locality. Consequently such birds as carrion-crows and magpies are abundant, and even sparrow- hawks hold their own. The county is traversed east and west by gentle hills separated by valleys averaging about half a mile in width, with stretches of open undulating country dotted about with small villages at some distance apart from one another. The soil is mostly light, and either a strong red loam or surface-earth on limestone, with here and there some cold woodland clay. The streams are small and seem to be dwindling, and there are only two pieces of ornamental water of any size — at Exton and Burley. These, small as they are, have contributed very largely to the list of Rutland birds, more especially in the case of stragglers and occasional visitors, such as the bearded tit, recently recorded for the first time in this county. But besides the natural disabilities of size, situation, and physical features, Rutland labours under a further disadvantage owing to the total absence of earlier records relating to its ornithology. None of the old writers of natural history so much as allude to it. The only trust- worthy information relating to Rutland birds prior to 1825 — and it is of little value — is to be gleaned from the notes kept by a certain Thomas Barker of Lyndon Hall, Rutland, between the years 1736 and 1 80 1. He was brother-in-law to Gilbert White, and the very first reference to a Rutland bird which we possess was from the pen of the immortal naturalist of Selborne, who notes under date 31 March, 55