GREEN3HANK.
nt Wast a BOHM of thai species were stopped liy the discharge. I remarked that the adults were in
almost full summer plumage and nearly double ihe size of the immature bird*; the legi and feet of both
old and young were of a dirty greenish-yellow tinge. While shooting on Breydon in May 1878, we
noticed that a few Grecnshauks, in company with Bed-hanks came daily to Ihe Hals as the tide fell, tanking
themselves at high water to the slades in the marshes; these were doubtless the young of the previous
year, the feathers on the head and ueek being exceedingly light and totally different to the state of
plumage exhibited by the adults during the breeding-scason.
During stormy nights these birds are often attracted by tin' lights, and may be heard in company
with other Waders screaming over towns; I repeatedly detected their shrill outcries among the varied
notes of several large and noisy Hocks that passed and circled over Yarmouth on the night of the Mb
of Bepterebor, 1S72, anil again on the 88th of August the following year. Even when undisturbed by
sudden atmospheric changes. Greens!tanks may be heard while on wing during the hours of darkness :
half an hour after midnight on the 22nd of July. 1878, while quanting epiietly up one of the rivers
running through the Hat country in the east of Norfolk, we listened for some minutes to their unmistakable
notes as a pair winged their way overhead, apparently holding a course pointing due north-east.
A stiff breeze of wind not iml'reipicntly brings docks of these and other Waders to the hills and marshes
around the Norfolk broads at any season of the year. On the 2'Sh of April, L8R8, the wind blowing strongly
from the east-south-east and exceedingly cold, a number of Black and Common Terns as well as Waders
were driven for shelter to the flooded marshes ami sheltered portions of lliekling Broad. Chance visitors,
such us Curlew, Whimbrel, Greeiishanks, and Dunlins, were in swarms, while the Peewits, Redshanks, and
Ruffs and Beeves had greatly increased in numbers, their ranks baling IHVU recruited by birds on passage
to more northern quarters.
I have met with this species only on a single occasion in 1 inter, and then its presence at that time
of year was evidently compulsory. On the 11th of December, 1882, an adult bird in light-tinted
plumage, with the breast streaked with black, was shot at a brackish pool just inside the shingle-banks
between Jshoreham and Lancing. On rising from the water's edge, I remarked that its flight appeared to be
much impeded by wounds or weakness, and on further examination it was discovered that the wing bad
been cither imperfectly pinioned or cut by a shot. It may not be out of place to state that the points
of both upjHT and lower mandibles were of a dark horn tint, an olive-greenish brown showing at the base,
the legs and feet exhibiting a dull olive-green tinge.
While shooting round the islands near the head of the Cromarty Birth in the early autumn of 1808,
I found several small parties of Gmmsbanks, evidently hatched out on the moors in the ncighljourhnnd,
feeding among the weeds that grow profusely on the moist soil of the muillluts. A few of the younger
birds that were killed by the punt-gun while in pursuit of fowl or other Waders proved by no means
unpalatable, though excessively fat, uhen properly dressed. As Snipes, however, were abundant and
easily obtained, I did not molest these interesting juveniles to any extent.