File:An illustrated manual of British birds (1899) (20530308228).jpg

Title: An illustrated manual of British birds
Identifier: cu31924000047815 (find matches)
Year: 1899 (1890s)
Authors: Saunders, Howard, 1835-1907
Subjects: Birds
Publisher: London, Gurney and Jackson
Contributing Library: Cornell University Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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RALLID^. 517
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THE MOOR-HEN. GallInula chloropus (Linnseus). This familiar species, also known as the Water-hen, is generally distributed throughout the British Islands, and is, as a rule, stationary; though a partial migration takes place in winter from the northern districts where the cold weather is severe and continuous. Else- where the Moor-hen manages to exist very well during frosts, resorting to running streams when ponds are frozen over, and finding shelter in plantations, hedge-rows and thick bushes. Its trivial name had its origin at the time when ' moor' was equivalent to mire or ' marsh.' As a wanderer the Moor-hen has occurred in the Faeroes and the south of Iceland ; but in Scandinavia it only breeds sparingly up to lat. 63°, while in Russia it seldom nests as far north as St. Petersburg. Throughout the rest of Europe it is more or less common in suitable localities, and is resident in the Canaries, Madeira and the Azores, as well as in Africa north of the Sahara ; its numbers in the last being reinforced by migrants from the north in winter. Southward it can be traced along both sides of that continent to Cape Colony, but birds found in Madagascar, Reunion and the Seychelles are some- what different, while a remarkable island-species, G. nesiotis, is found in the Tristan da Cunha group. From Ceylon and the Philippines northward our Moor-hen is resident in Asia up to the main island of Japan, and it breeds as far north as Lake Baikal in Siberia. A closely-

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