File:An illustrated manual of British birds (1889) (14748607525).jpg

Identifier: illustratedmanua01saun (find matches)
Title: An illustrated manual of British birds
Year: 1889 (1880s)
Authors: Saunders, Howard, 1835-1907
Subjects: Birds
Publisher: London, Gurney and Jackson
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

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e tubers of the sweetpotato, water-melons &c, with beetles and other insects in winter;while in captivity I have seen a Crane capture and swallow a Sparrow. The adult has a red warty patch on the crown ; general plumageslate-grey ; inner secondaries long, drooping, and bluish-black incolour. Length 48 in. ; wing 21 in. The male is larger and ratherdarker than the female. The young have no red on the head; theupper plumage is greyish-brown, and the hind plumes are short.Breeding does not take place till the third year. A male example of the Demoiselle Crane, Grits virgo, is said tohave been shot at Deerness, East Mainland, Orkney, on May 14th,1S63, a companion bird being pursued, but not obtained (Zool.p. 8692). This inhabitant of Africa, Asia, and the south of Europe,has wandered as far north as Sweden and Heligoland; it is alsofrequently kept in confinement. An African Crowned Crane,Balearica pavonina, was killed near Dairy, Ayrshire, on Sunday,September 17th, 1871. OTIDID.E. 509
Text Appearing After Image:
fly V THE GREAT BUSTARD. Otis tarda, Linnaeus. Until the year 1526 the Cireat Bustard used to breed, sparingly,as far north as tlie flat portion of the Lothians, on the Scottishside of the Border; and southward it was common on the moors,extensive downs and plains of England, to the Channel. Enclo-sure, the planting of trees, and the increase of population con-tributed to the gradual diminution of its numbers, and it passedaway, unrecorded, from Iserkshire, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire, thewolds of Lincolnshire and the downs of Sussex, while the first tenyears of this century saw the extinction of the birds indigenous toSalisbury Plain. On the Eastern Wolds of Yorkshire the survivorof former droves was trapped in 1832-33; and in Norfolk andSuffolk the last fertile eggs were taken about 1838, though a fewbirds lingered to a somewhat later date. The Bustard is now only an 510 GREAT BUSTARD. irregular wanderer to Great Britain—exceptionally as far north asthe Orkneys ; the winter of 1

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