AMONG THE
BIRDS IN NORTHERN SHIRES
AMONG THE BIRDS
IN
NORTHERN SHIRES
BY
CHARLES DIXON
Author of “Rural Bird-life” “The Game Birds and Wild Fowl of the British Islands”“British Sea Birds” “Curiosities of Bird-life”“The Migration of Birds” “The Migration of British Birds” “Bird-life in a Southern County” &c
WITH COLOURED FRONTISPIECE AND FORTY OTHER ILLUSTRATIONSBY CHARLES WHYMPER
BLACKIE AND SON LIMITED
LONDON GLASGOW AND DUBLIN
1900
The present volume must be regarded more as a popularintroduction to the bird-life of our northern shires thanin any way as an exhaustive faunal treatise, although atthe same time we believe almost every indigenous specieshas been included. For twenty years we lived surroundedby these northern birds, so that we may fairly claim tohave served our ornithological apprenticeship amongstthem. With the birds of South Yorkshire and NorthDerbyshire we are specially familiar; whilst repeated visitsnot only to the Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, and Northumbrianlittoral, but farther afield into Lancashire, and various partsof the Lowlands and the Highlands of Scotland, haveenabled us to acquire much personal information relatingto the avifauna of many a northern shire.
The difference between the avifaunæ of the northern andsouthern shires is strongly marked in many respects. Theirstudy makes a record of avine comparisons of the mostintense interest. The important effects produced by latitudeand climate upon the bird-life of these widely separatedareas make material for fascinating investigation, andhave been fully dwelt upon as opportunities were presented.This variation in avine phenomena is not only far toooften entirely ignored, but is apt to lead the student of[vi]bird-lore astray; due allowance has to be made in manycases for this difference in latitude, and all that it involves.The present volume, then, to a great extent a study ofornithological comparisons, will, we trust, be of some serviceto the bird lover or the bird student in his task of makingallowances.
Unquestionably these northern shires from an ornithologicalpoint of view are much more interesting than thesouthern, and especially the south-western counties. Theiravifauna is richer, and presents far greater variety, notablyduring the breeding season; whilst the marvellous phenomenonof Migration there unfolds itself each season in amanner that is never remarked elsewhere.
CHARLES DIXON.
Paignton, S. Devon.
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