spring amongst some rushes growing near a river, my attention
was arrested by observing a Black-headed Bunting
shuffling through the rushes, and trailing along the ground, as
if one of her legs or wings were broken. I followed her to
see the result; and she, having led me to some considerable
distance, took wing, no doubt much rejoiced on return to
find her stratagems had been successful in preserving her
young brood ; although not in preventing the discovery of
her nest, containing five young ones, which I found was
placed, as usual, on the side of a hassock, or clump of grass,
and almost screened from view by overhanging dead grass.
I have invariably found it in such a situation, and never suspended
between reeds, as is sometimes stated : it was composed
of dead grass, and lined sparingly with hair.”
Mr. Neville Wood, in his British Song Birds, relates an
occurrence with the Black-headed Bunting which indicates a
still higher grade of intellectual character. It is thus described
:— “ Some years ago, when walking with a friend, I
remember seeing two of these birds in an osier bed, the male
perched erect at the summit of a willow stem, and his mate
remaining beneath, or only occasionally coming within view.
On our entering the osiers, they both flew around us in great
alarm, mostly in silence, but sometimes uttering a low mournful
kind of note, at the same time darting suddenly about
the hedge and willow stems, as if impatient for our immediate
departure; and their manners were so different from
those commonly observed in the species, that we were convinced
that there must be a nest thereabouts. I was well
aware of the difficulty of finding its little tenement in a situation
of that kind, and accordingly we both of us began to move
in different directions, in order to discover by the actions of
the birds where their treasure lay. My friend traversed one
side of the osier bed, and myself the other; but still the
loving and faithful couple remained in precisely the same
spot, where the junction of two hedge-rows formed a comer ;
and we therefore concluded, naturally enough, that in that
spot all their hopes were centered. But a close and minute
investigation of the whole corner, during which time we laid
the ground completely bare, Revealed nothing to us. At
length, a full hour after the commencement of our labours, I
hit upon the nest by mere chance, at exactly the opposite
end to that at which the Reed Buntings had been, and still
were, prosecuting their whinings and manoeuvres, which now
proved beyond a doubt, what I had never before suspected,
that the birds had been all the time endeavouring to attract
our attention towards them, instead of towards their nest.”
The eggs of this bird are four or five in number, of a
pale purple brown colour, streaked with darker purple brown;
the length nine lines and a half, and seven lines in breadth.
Incubation commencing, Mr. Jenyns says, about the first
week in May, and occasionally a second brood is produced
in July. The food of the Black-headed Bunting is grain,
seeds, insects, and their larvæ ; the young are probably fed
for a time on the latter. In winter these birds associate with
others, forming flocks, and visiting gardens, barn doors, and
stack-yards in search of seeds, or grain of any kind.
The Black-headed Bunting occurs in the localities suited
to its habits in all the southern counties of England ; it is
common in Wales ; and Mr. Thompson includes it as common
and indigenous to Ireland. North of London it is also
found in most, if not all, the counties as far as the Tweed.
In Scotland it is common in the usual localities ; has been
observed in the Hebrides, and was seen by Mr. Selby upon
the margins of all the lochs, and in the swampy districts of
Sutherlandshire ; but according to Dr. Fleming this bird
does not visit Orkney or Shetland. I t is only a summer
visiter to Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, appearing in
April and retiring in September ; it is found also from Russia