Mr. Wells Bladen, the well-known Staffordshire ornithologist, reports on the Wheatear, which arrived earlier than usual, telling us that he saw one on a slag-heap at Etruria on March 3rd. In April again he witnessed the curious sight of five Wheatears, mobbing a Kestrel on their slag-heap and driving off the intruder quickly. In June there were at least a dozen of these birds frequenting the heap, and one pair had nested within twenty feet of a very busy railway siding. The nest, with its lovely pale blue eggs, was in a hole in a bank of fused clinkers, two feet from the ground. The eggs were hatched safely, but the young birds were unfortunately killed by some mischievous person before they were old enough to leave the nest. It was a pity the bird made its nest so near the ground, for, as a rule the great heaps which railway passengers between Stoke and Crewe have seen and wondered at, by night as well as by day, are little interfered with, or trespassed on. The dreary slag-heaps in the neighbourhood of blast-furnaces would appear to be spots equally unattractive to man and beast, and especially so to that brightly marked migrant the Wheatear, as it is known on the sunny, wind-swept downs and sandhills near the sea. In August again, one was seen on a railway waggon.
Wheatears leave us by the beginning of October, but now and again a few stray birds are said to winter here in mild districts.
The Wheatear has the crown, back of the head and back a beautiful ashen-grey; throat a faint buffish-white. There is a black stripe from the bill to the eye, which broadens out towards the ear. Underparts nearly white, breast yellowish. The side feathers of the wings are white towards the base—at the end black; the middle feathers entirely black. Bill awl-shaped, and, like the legs, black. The female bird and the young are less varied in colour. The Wheatear hides its nest away in heaps of stones, and crevices of the earth, and is most discreet as a rule in ensuring its safety. It lays five eggs, occasionally seven, which are usually of a uniform pale-blue colour, sometimes faintly dotted.
USEFUL.
THE STONECHAT.