REDSTART.
IWTICILLA PH(ENICURA.
Tins brightly plumaged and attractive species is only a summer visitor to the British Islands. The Redstart
(or Fire tail, as it is not uufrequently termed) arrives on our shores about the end of the first week in April; and
all hut a few stragglers have taken their departure before the end of September. The lafest entry in my
note-books concerning this species I find under date of September 11, 1871, on which day a female pitched
on the fore deck of my gunning-punt, while sculling up to a bunch of fowl on the deep water at the upper part
of Broydon, near Yarmouth—an excellent proof that the approach was carried out in a workmanlike manner.
This species is well known over the greater portion of England and Scotland. I have met with but few
in the most northern counties of the Highlands, though in certain parts of Inverness-shire and Perthshire
it is particularly abundant, more so, in fact, than in any other county I am acquainted with. As might be
expected from the nature of its habits, it is only found in tile wooded portions of the country. In the greater
number of the southern counties of Kngland, the Redstart is more numerous at the seasons of migration,
those that are met with being for the most part either on their way towards their summer quarters or
returning south for the winter. In Norfolk it is not uncommon ; I remarked the birds especially numerous
in the vicinity of Norwich. My attention has been attracted on several occasions during the summer months
by the bright colours of a male perched on a garden-wall or tree in some private grounds in the outskirts of
the city. I met with a few in some of the more timbered portions of Yorkshire and Cumberland; though
it can scarcely be described as rare in these localities, if is decidedly local.
By the middle of August these birds commence to gather down towards the south coast. I am aware
of none breeding in the immediate neighbourhood, though I have repeatedly observed a few young ones in
my own garden near Brighton soon after that date. During the last week in August lsS2 an immature bird,
which had been noticed on several previous occasions, darted out from under some bushes, and bopped off with
a grape which had been flung to a brood of young Blackbirds, who, together with other pensioners, usually
collected at certain hours in quest of what might be provided for them.
The nesting-habits of the Redstart have been so accurately described by numberless writers that it will
be sufficient to state that, as a rule, it makes use of holes in trees or old walls, though at times it rears its
young in somewhat eccentric situations. Some years back I noticed a pair were building in the foundation
of the Osprey's nest on the old castle of Loch-an-Eilan, in Inverness-shirc. At that time the rightful owners
of the structure had been banished by frequent persecution. I am ignorant whether the Redstart still resorts
to the same situalion since the refuru of the Ospreys to their old quarters.
The fact that the nest of the Fishing-Eagle bad been again tenanted was recently proclaimed in print,
in order, as the writer stated, to incite large landed proprietors in the north to afford more effectual protection
to these and other interesting birds of prey. Though this information was doubtless given in the hopes of
adding to the chances of the Ospreys bringing off their brood, I fear it may only result in induein" some