FEMALE REDSTART WITH FOOD FOR CHICKS.
It is found breeding in suitable places all over England and Wales, and less numerously in Scotland. I have met with it most commonly in certain parts of the Principality and in Westmorland and Northumberland. It appears to be partial to isolated farmhouses with a few old trees round them and plenty of straggling, dilapidated outbuildings, old ruins, and gardens surrounded by moss-grown stone walls. I have frequently found the bird, however, breeding in solitary woods, and secured the photograph showing the nest and eggs figuring in this article in the silent depths of a great Highland pine forest.
The male Redstart has a short but soft and very sweet song, much resembling that of the Pied Flycatcher. Whilst staying out all night making observations, both in South Wales and the North of England, I have heard it very late in the evening and very early in the morning. It is oft repeated, and the singer borrows notes from many other feathered vocalists, such as the Swallow, Blackbird, Whitethroat, and Nightingale.
MALE REDSTART WITH FOOD FOR YOUNG.
The call note of this species sounds something like wee-tit-tit.
REDSTART’S NEST AND EGGS BENEATH
A STONE ON THE GROUND. THE STONE
WAS LIFTED TO SHOW NEST AND EGGS.
The nest is situated in a hole in a tree or stone wall, sometimes under a stone partly buried in the ground, where a Wheatear might be expected to make her home, as in the case of the one figured in our illustration on page 195. It is composed of dry grass, dead leaves, and rootlets, and lined with hair and feathers.