Birds' Nests, Eggs and Egg-CollectingKearton, Richard
Science
Birds' Nests, Eggs and Egg-Collecting
Kearton, Richard
Birds -- Eggs; Birds -- Great Britain; Birds -- Nests
Trunks of trees, holes in walls and banks made by rats, moles, or mice,
are selected for incubation purposes by this little bird. The nest is
built of moss, wool, and hair, and contains from five to eight, or even
nine eggs, white, spotted and freckled with light red or red-brown.
THE GUILLEMOT.
The Guillemot makes no nest at all, but deposits its single egg on the
ledges of sea-cliffs in a great many places round our coasts. A verbal
description of it is almost useless, as the colouring presents such
a wonderful variety of tints. The ground colours are white, cream,
yellowish-green, blue, reddish-brown, pea-green, purplish-brown,
&c. Some are profusely spotted and blotched or streaked with black,
black-brown, or grey in great variety; whilst others are scarcely
marked at all. Our illustration may be taken as a very good specimen of
one kind of colouring and marking, though a very pretty one might be
given of an entirely different colour and character.
[Illustration: EGGS.
1. Guillemot. 2. Rock Dove. 3. Dotterel. 4. Marsh Tit.
5. Little Auk. 6. Red-Legged Partridge. 7. Sanderling.
8. Long-tailed Titmouse. 9. Razor-bill.
]
THE ROCK DOVE.
Ledges and fissures or crevices in sea-cliffs are the nesting-places of
this bird, which uses sticks, twigs, heath, and dead grass for building
purposes. Her eggs are two in number, quite white.
THE DOTTEREL.
Mountain-tops in the North of Scotland are the favourite nesting-places
of the Dotterel, which is now becoming comparatively rare in districts
where it was once common. It uses no materials for nest-making, simply
laying three eggs in a slight cavity amongst woolly-fringe moss or
other mountain vegetation which affords some little concealment. The
eggs are of a dark cream or olivaceous-brown colour thickly blotched or
spotted with dark brown or brownish-black.
THE MARSH TIT.
Holes in trees (generally willows or pollards), banks, &c., are the
places adopted by the Marsh Tit for its nest, which is composed of
moss, wool, and down from rabbits, or the ripe catkins of willows. Her
eggs number from six to eight, or even as many as ten have been found.
They are white, spotted with red-brown, more thickly at the larger end.
THE LITTLE AUK.
The rocky shores of Spitzbergen, Greenland, and Iceland form suitable
breeding resorts for this bird, which makes no nest, but deposits its
single egg on the bare ground in some crevice or under loose rocks. The
egg is of a pale greenish-blue, or white tinged with greenish-blue,
a little spotted and veined, especially at the larger end, with
rust-colour or yellowish-brown. Sometimes the egg has no spots or
streaks, at others only indistinctly streaked or veined at the large
end.
THE RED-LEGGED PARTRIDGE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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