FIELDFARES AT THE TOWER
The birds that are strange to London eyes are very nearly all seen in the autumn, from September to November. At this mutable season a person who elects to spend his nights on the roof, with rugs and an umbrella to keep out cold and wet, may be rewarded by hearing far-off shrill delicate noises of straggling sandpipers or other shore birds on passage, or the mysterious cry of the lapwing, ‘wailing his way from cloud to cloud.’
All these rare sights and sounds are for the very patient watchers and listeners; nevertheless they are the only ‘authentic tidings’ the Londoner receives of that great and wonderful wave of life which travels southward over half the globe in advance of winter. This annual exodus and sublime flight to distant delectable regions beyond the sea is, however, only taken part in by some of the feathered people; meanwhile the others that remain to brave the cold and scarcity are also seen to be infected with a restless spirit and desire of change. The starling, missel-thrush, larks and pipits, and other kinds, alter their way of life, uniting in flocks and becoming wanderers over the face of the country. Finches, too, go a-gypsying: the more sedentary species leave their breeding-haunts for suitable winter quarters; and everywhere there is a great movement, a changing of places, packing and scattering, a hurrying to and fro all over the land.
The London birds are no exception, although their autumnal movements have hitherto attracted little attention. These movements are becoming more noticeable, owing to changes going on in the character of the metropolitan bird population. The sparrow, as we have seen, does not leave home, but recently there has been a great increase in the more vagrant species, the starling and wood-pigeon especially. During the last few years the wood-pigeon has been growing somewhat more domestic, and less inclined to leave town than formerly, but from time to time the old wandering instinct reasserts itself, and it was observed that during the autumn of 1896 a majority of the birds left London. At Lincoln’s Inn Fields there were thirteen birds down to the end of September, then all but one disappeared. This solitary stayer-at-home had been sprung upon and injured by a cat some time before the day of departure.
Last year, 1897, the autumnal exodus was even greater. Thus, on October 25 I walked the whole length of the three central parks, and saw no pigeons except one pair of young birds not long out of the nest, in Hyde Park, and one parent bird feeding them. The other parent had probably gone away to the country, leaving his mate to rear this very late brood as best she could. Doubtless many of these wanderers from the metropolis get killed in the country, but in December and January the survivors return to the safety of the parks, and to a monotonous diet of stale bread.
It is probable that with the change of temperature in September and October the London wood-pigeons, like so many birds, are seized by a restless and roving spirit; but I am inclined to believe that the taste of wild nuts and fruits, which they get in the parks at that season, is one cause of their going away. They do not get much of this natural food; they first strip the oaks of their acorns almost before they are quite ripe, depriving the London urchins of their little harvest, and then attack the haws and holly-berries; and when this small supply has been exhausted the birds go further afield in search of more.
WOOD-PIGEON FEEDING ON HAWS