Among the Birds in Northern Shires

Notwithstanding persecution, the Kestrel and the Sparrow-hawk happily can still be regarded as fairly common birds in all these woodlands. Trapping and shooting do their best each year to hasten on their extermination, but fortunately both birds breed in localities where their nests are not so very easy to discover. The Kestrel is especially fortunate in this respect, for it breeds in the deserted nests of Crows, Stock Doves, and Magpies, or in the old drey of a squirrel, and a good many of these nests may be searched without finding the one selected; not only so, but the trees are generally in full foliage before the eggs are laid or the young hatched, and this fact conduces greatly to the concealment of many a nest. We can recall many occasions when we have climbed to a score or more deserted nests in a single day, amongst these grand old woods, on the off-chance of discovering Kestrels' or Long-eared Owls' eggs, and considered ourselves well rewarded if we found one or two at most occupied by these second tenants. On the other hand, many have been the times when we have seen keepers shoot into these old nests, as well as fire and kill the brooding Hawk as she sat upon her eggs or sheltered her downy young, in spite of all remonstrance upon our part. The Sparrow-hawk breeds a little earlier. We have had a long and varied experience with the domestic economy of this plucky little bird, and we have invariably found that it not only builds its own nest, but makes a new one every season. Indeed, in not a few cases we have noticed that when its eggs have been taken from one nest it has built another in the vicinity in which to lay a new clutch. The larch woods in the Rivelin Valley – around Hollow Meadows – are, or used to be, a very favourite resort of this Hawk, possibly because keepers were somewhat lax, or never visited some of the coppices from one year to another. In these larch and spruce-fir woods, many old nests of the Sparrow-hawk might be seen, the deserted tenements of years and years. It was also rather remarkable that most of these nests were in trees within a stone’s-throw of the artillery volunteers' target, and all around them were larches and spruces snapped and splintered, and the ground and rocks scored by the conical cannon-balls which lay in dozens all over the place. From one nest in this wood we obtained, by careful management, never quite emptying it, no less than fourteen eggs during a single spring. Curiously enough upon more than one occasion we have found a nest of the Goldcrest in the same spruce-fir as the nest of the Sparrow-hawk.

Nowhere else in our experience were the Magpies allowed to live in such peace as they enjoyed in this romantic valley. On the south side, from Bell Hagg onwards to Hollow Meadows, was almost one continuous woodland, coppice succeeding coppice, until they terminated in the larch and spruce woods, where the Sparrow-hawks bred, and through which Wyming Brook bored its way under a perfect archway of trees from its source on the Bamford Moors near Redmires. Within this few miles of timber we have frequently known as many as a dozen nests of the Magpie all occupied. In not a few cases the old nest was returned to each spring, renovated and used again. Some of these nests were made high up in the oak and alder trees, others were placed in birch-trees, and less frequently in a stunted white-thorn growing amidst the briars and brambles and bracken and boulders of millstone grit on the open rough land. Not a few were placed in the alder-trees that fringed the streams between the reservoirs. The Jay, on the other hand, was a scarce bird here, for the woods had little or no undergrowth, in which that bird specially delights. In most other woods of our acquaintance the Magpie was a sorely-persecuted species, and every bird and every nest were destroyed that the keepers could discover. Several times during the course of the spring many keepers hold a grand "vermin battue". A keeper will gather round him half a dozen village loafers, and then the precious party will proceed to hunt the covers, killing every Magpie, Jay, or Hawk that comes in their way, and pulling out every nest they can discover. We know the ways of these gentry only too well, for years ago we often accompanied such a party, helpless to save, yet glad to increase our knowledge of woodland bird-life. Not a few nests have we seen on these occasions and held our peace, or visited others containing young Hawks and Magpies which we have saved by a fictitious report to the expectant keeper and his murdering band below. In any case the slaughter at the close of the day was sad enough; and as the capacious game-bags were emptied, and the Jays and Magpies and Hawks, with perhaps an odd Nightjar or an Owl – beautiful creatures each one of them, and some of the fairest avine ornaments our woodlands can boast – were turned out into a heap by the kennel door, we ceased to wonder why such species in not a few localities exist as names or traditions only. Apart from any utilitarian motive that should prompt their preservation – and mind, some of these birds are perfectly harmless or of downright service to man – surely on æsthetic grounds a universal plea should be raised for their protection, and such brutal slaughter staid once and for ever.

As we previously remarked, the Jay is not so universally distributed as the Magpie; it loves cover, and delights in such woods where the undergrowth of hazel is dense and where clumps of holly-trees abound. It is also fond of the large shrubberies and copses, especially such as adjoin parks and well-timbered farm lands. We had Jays nesting more or less commonly close to our residence, in the shrubbery attached to Meersbrook Park – a famous spot for birds five-and-twenty years ago, before the builder appeared upon the scene and before it became one of the public parks of Sheffield. Here was established a fine rookery, and the densely wooded grounds round what is now the Ruskin Museum were the favourite haunts of Thrushes and Blackbirds, of Redwings and Bramblings during winter, of Greenfinches, Bullfinches, Titmice, seclusion-loving Warblers, Flycatchers, Robins, Wrens, and other birds. For many years this half-wood half-shrubbery was our constant resort. The wary Rooks got to know us most intimately, and never left the tree-tops or made any unusual noise or disturbance as we wandered under the nests. But let a stranger venture near and all was commotion and uproar at once. The sable fellows would not allow me a companion; and whenever I walked beneath the nest-trees accompanied by a friend the birds would be sure to raise a prolonged chorus of protesting cries. We never knew a spot where more birds came at nightfall during winter to roost amongst the evergreens. For years we used to conceal ourselves in some favourite spot and watch the interesting ways and doings of these mixed avine hosts as they settled themselves to rest. In spring and summer it was equally favoured as a nesting-place. Fortunately all bird-life here was respected; every species was safe and welcome within this fair domain; it was a sanctuary, a place of refuge for all birds irrespective of their ill-deeds, their bad or shady characters. No gun was ever fired within the sacred fences, and the birds could live their happy lives in peace. Small wonder then that the Jay took kindly to such a haven of safety and seclusion; and it was always a source of delight to watch the troops of young birds and their parents, that in summer-time used to troop about the underwood, patches of gaudy colour amongst the green, and noisy and impudent as is ever their wont. In the earlier years of our experience an odd Pheasant or two dwelt in this spot and added to its interest; their disappearance was a sign of that coming change that was to find its culmination in the more or less complete banishment of bird-life from this chosen spot.

Sherwood Forest, especially in the Dukeries and round about Edwinstowe, was also another favourite woodland haunt of ours. Here, however, the conditions were somewhat different. Game reigned supreme; the deity of the woods was the Pheasant, and less favoured birds were harassed and persecuted by the keepers. Notwithstanding this there is a good deal of bird-life in the forest of surpassing interest to the ornithologist. For instance, one of the most interesting colonies of Jackdaws in our islands is established there. The birds have taken possession of the hollow and ancient oak-trees – many of them mere shells of bark, yet outwardly presenting a green and vigorous appearance and bearing their heavy crops of acorns in the autumn – which for a thousand years or more have stood in sunshine and storm upon ground made classic by Robin Hood. Indeed, it requires little stretch of the imagination to repeople these forest glades with the sturdy outlaws that tradition says dwelt amongst them once upon a time, in open defiance of the authorities, and fed sumptuously upon the deer and other game with which the Forest abounded. Then the oak-trees were in their prime; now they are gnarled and knotted and wrinkled, loaded with dead branches, and full of hollows and crevices, the result of countless storms and tempests. The adaptive Jackdaw has not been slow to seize upon such an advantageous spot, and has multiplied apace. Many hundreds of nests may be counted in one comparatively small area of the forest, and some of the tree-trunks are literally choked with sticks from root to summit, the accumulation of more years than any of us can remember. Scattered amongst these Jackdaws is an almost equally extensive colony of Starlings, many of these latter birds nesting in the same holes as them. We have repeatedly found that some of the largest piles of sticks contained no nest at the top – as if the original owners had finally succumbed to old age, yet not before they had hoarded and left as a monument to their many years of industry a cart-load or more of nest materials. We have noticed the same thing in Rooks' nests, piles of sticks a yard high or more, yet never occupied season after season, until blown out by winter gales or filched by other members of the community. The grand old timber here is also attractive to the Stock Dove; and whilst we are examining the homes of the Jackdaws and the Starlings, a Stock Dove every now and then dashes with impetuous haste out of the holes and crannies. Rarest of all, we may sometimes stumble across the home of the Tawny Owl. The keeper in this particular part of the forest takes good care that Owls shall not live in it in peace, nevertheless a fair number contrive to elude him. He had also tales to tell of Hawks (possibly Hobbys and Buzzards) that formerly bred round about his special beats, but "none of late years". More interested was he in the Wild Ducks and Woodcocks that nested up and down the forest, and much information he was disposed to impart concerning the latter birds (about which he had several theories of his own) as we used to sit in his wood-surrounded cottage and quaff his home-brewed ale, which he was never tired of assuring us would never produce any evil or intoxicating effects. Then after our chat and refreshment he would be prevailed upon to wander out into the woodlands, after first carefully taking down from its pegs the scrupulously clean pin-fire breech-loader, and whistling to his favourite dog, and conduct us by paths only known to himself to many a secluded spot where shy birds were nesting. Here it might be a Pheasant’s nest he would allow us cautiously to approach, and peer down at the brown-mottled back of the hen bird as she quietly brooded over her numerous eggs; there a Wild Duck’s nest out amongst the bracken would be pointed out; whilst on rare occasions he would wander farther abroad into the most secluded woodlands, and take us to inspect the home of the Woodcock placed snugly under the bracken and brambles. Unfortunately, like all his class, he was dead set against “vermin” of every kind, furred and feathered, even including the squirrels that leapt about in the branches overhead. Against these he had a particular aversion, for he said they were “pestering varmints” that sucked every egg they could find. In the more open parts of the forest, where the birch-trees are abundant, we often used to find a nest of the Missel-thrush; not that there was anything specially remarkable in this, but we never saw a nest of this Thrush in Sherwood Forest without thinking of the tradition that so inseparably connects the mistletoe with it. There is no other district in our islands known to us where this parasitic plant is so plentiful; it grows in huge bushes on the poplar trees, a conspicuous object for miles across the country in the Dukeries, and the white-thorns in some spots are thickly studded with it, best seen, of course, during winter. And yet we have never noticed Missel-thrushes in any exceptional numbers in this district, nor have we ever seen them feeding upon the berries. Talking of the nest of this bird brings to mind a fact we have remarked in at least two widely different localities, and that is the number of nests that are sometimes built quite close together. Along the streams in the Rivelin Valley they used to be found in the alder-trees, perhaps half a dozen within a hundred yards or so; whilst in the swampy corner of a wood at Norton we have remarked several nests in adjoining trees. The prettiest nests of this Thrush we have ever seen were from the Rivelin Valley, and composed externally almost completely of sphagnum moss, amongst which a few slender birch twigs were interwoven. We never found more than four eggs in the nest of the Missel-thrush, and always consider that this is the normal number, never less and never more. Indeed, the bird is as regular in this respect as the Snipes, and more so, perhaps, than any other Passerine species. The Carrion Crow, we are glad to say, still manages to maintain a place in these northern woodlands, but in not a few places he is yearly becoming scarcer. He is without doubt a sad thief and a plundering rascal, yet in spite of all his dark deeds we should be sorry to see him banished. His bulky well-made nest, to which he returns, when left unmolested, year by year, is generally placed far up one of the tallest trees in the wood. It is interesting to remark, however, that he is a much later breeder in these northern woods than in the southern shires. In Devonshire we have known the Carrion Crow commence building in March, but in South Yorkshire the eggs are not usually laid before the end of April or even in May. Farther north, as readers may be aware, this species is gradually and almost entirely replaced by the Hooded Crow, a bird that we have already noticed. Birds of the Pigeon tribe are common in most of these northern woods. Of these the Ring Dove is by far the most numerous – too numerous for the farmers in not a few localities. Until we came south we had scarcely any idea of how tame and trustful this species is when left unmolested. We always knew it as one of the shyest and wariest of birds, never allowing us to approach it within gunshot unless it thought itself unseen, and best shot from an ambuscade in the woods or during the evening when it came to certain favourite spots to roost. Gamekeepers shoot a great many of these birds from the rough platforms in the woods erected to scatter food upon for the Pheasants. The Stock Dove is not so common, but this is perhaps because it is not so conservative in choice of a haunt, and is therefore scattered over a much wider area. In some parts of South Yorkshire and North Derbyshire it is known as the "Rockier". We have few other birds that adapt themselves to such a diversity of haunt, from the dense woods to the bare warrens, quarries, and ocean cliffs. Both these birds are breeding right through the spring and summer, well into the autumn. On the other hand, the Turtle Dove is a summer visitor only to the woods; but it is a local and somewhat scarce bird so far north as South Yorkshire. We know it breeds regularly in the well-timbered country about Bawtry; we have seen it in the Wharncliffe Woods, and occasionally in suitable spots in North Derbyshire. It rarely reaches this northern fringe of its British habitat before May, but in Devonshire it may frequently be seen at the end of April. Its migrations, however, are somewhat rapid, for there is not much difference between the date of arrival in northern and southern counties alike. This Dove, like the Jay, loves woods with plenty of undergrowth and fields that are surrounded with tall uncut hedges full of trees. Its noisy love-cry in early summer we always think is one of the most pleasing sounds of the green woods, but unfortunately one that is not very frequent in our northern shires. Its migration south begins in September.

Of the Game Birds of the woodlands we shall have little to say. The Pheasant, of course, is the most familiar of all; comparatively few observers are fortunate enough to meet with the magnificent Capercailzie, and the Black Grouse is scarcely common enough to be classed as a well-known one. We often think it would have been better had the Romans left the Pheasant to its continental home, for indirectly its introduction to our islands has caused many a beautiful indigenous bird to suffer persecution. The Pheasant is by no means a harmless bird; it works a good deal of mischief amongst the crops, as many a poor struggling farmer knows; it would probably become extinct in a few years were it not strictly preserved and its numbers increased by artificial means; whilst it has been the cause of more ill-feeling, crime, and absolute human bloodshed than any other bird in the British Islands. The price we pay to maintain this alien amongst our avifauna is a high one; its presence is purchased at the cost of countless numbers of indigenous birds of greater and more effective beauty; its protection is made an excuse for the incessant butchery of some of our most interesting species. The introduction of exotic species into any country is sure, sooner or later, to affect some portion of the native fauna in a disastrous way; and yet there are writers – deeming themselves naturalists – who urge the introduction of various gaudy exotic birds, as if our woods and fields were not ornamented sufficiently by what is normally there, and which surely have the right to live – all Game Birds notwithstanding. We hear of no crusade against Hawks, and Owls, and Crows, and such-like species in wild uncivilized countries, and yet winged game is always abundant – at least until man and his breech-loader comes upon the scene; and we maintain that our indigenous Game Birds would well hold their own if all vermin were left in peace, and would be the healthier and stronger for it. The alien Pheasant we are not quite so certain about; but if not able to maintain itself against such enemies, then these islands would be all the better without it.

More interesting to the naturalist in these woods of the northern shires are the Woodpeckers. All three British species are represented in them, but the Green Woodpecker, the largest and showiest of all, is decidedly the least common. Curiously enough the exact reverse is the case in many a southern shire; in Devonshire, for instance, we may see more Green Woodpeckers in a week than we might see in a year in not a few of our northern woods. The two Spotted Woodpeckers are none the less interesting, however, although unfortunately they are much more difficult to discover, and apt to be thought much rarer than they really are. The Lesser Spotted Woodpecker is by far the most restricted in its distribution; indeed, we doubt if it is found at all north of Yorkshire. The Greater Spotted Woodpecker ranges a little farther north, but we are very near its normal limits in this direction in Yorkshire. It is somewhat remarkable that the forests of Scotland are devoid of Woodpeckers; whilst Ireland is equally unfortunate, none of the three species being known to breed there. This seems all the more extraordinary when we know that all three species breed up to much higher latitudes on the Continent, the two Spotted species going up to or beyond the Arctic circle, the Green species to a higher degree than the Shetlands. We have met with the Lesser Spotted Woodpecker in very small copses, and even in gardens and parks. During winter both species may be met with amongst timber, which they never frequent during the breeding season; in fact, they are given to wandering, and may be detected during the cold months in almost every description of well-timbered country. The habits of these birds are very similar, and they all breed in holes, and lay shining white eggs. Rarer and more local still is the curious Wryneck, a summer visitor only to our islands, and finding no habitation at all in Ireland. Its arrival in most places is usually coincident with that of the Cuckoo – hence in not a few localities it is known as the "Cuckoo’s Mate". Here again we have a bird that is much overlooked, its chaste and sober colouring (yet exquisitely beautiful in detail) and its shy and retiring ways and love for the timber all assisting in its concealment. The Wryneck is something of an anomaly. Internally it resembles the Woodpeckers (the Wrynecks form a sub-family of the Picidæ); its plumage is mottled and dusted and pencilled like that of a Nightjar; its tail-feathers are soft and flexible; it rarely, if ever, climbs the timber, and hops about the slender branches like the typical Passeres. These external characteristics are, however, quite in harmony with its ways of life.

Among the more familiar Passerine birds of the woodlands we may first allude to the Titmice. They are the special small birds of the trees, and every British species – if we exclude the abnormal Bearded Titmouse – is found amongst them. Not only so, but the northern woods in certain parts of Scotland are the exclusive home of the Crested Tit – a bird that we saw on one occasion near Sheffield. Few woods in our experience more abounded with Titmice than the birch and alder coppices along the Rivelin Valley, especially in autumn, and invariably mingled with them at that season were flights of migrant Goldcrests. Allied to the Titmice we also have the soberly arrayed little Creeper, and the more showy plumaged Nuthatch. The latter, however, is exceedingly local in our Yorkshire woods, and we are not aware that it breeds to the north of the county, or that it is found at all in Ireland. The Nightingale penetrates as far north as the Plain of York, perhaps exceptionally beyond, but it is rare enough in the neighbourhood of Sheffield, and we never had the good fortune to meet with it there during a residence of nearly twenty years, although we know the Sedge Warbler has not unfrequently been mistaken for it. A member of one of the allied genera, however, is common enough, we mean the gay and lively Redstart – the showiest, perhaps, of all the migrant band. In the coppice just above Bell Hagg the Redstart was very common. The Wheatear bred in the quarries there, but the Redstart loved the range of rocks that ran bulwark-like along the valley above the copse. We used to find its nest in the crevices of these rocks, as well as in holes among the birch-trees. We remember one nest in a decayed birch that contained eight eggs ranged neatly round in rows; another beneath the rock, at the top of Blackbrook, that bears an inscription to the effect that upon it Elliott the “corn-law rhymer” used to sit and write his poetry. Both Redstart and Wheatear are only birds of summer in our islands, the latter arriving perhaps a week before the former, in April. The three species of Willow Wren must also be included in this brief résumé of bird-life in the northern woods. Commonest of this charming trio we must class the Willow Wren. Our northern woods from April onwards are a specially chosen haunt of this delicate-looking little bird. It abounds in most, from the borders of the moors right up to the suburbs of the grimy northern manufacturing towns, and its sweet little refrain is one of the most familiar songs of the spring. Next, perhaps, in order of abundance we should place the Wood Wren, the largest, and at the same time the showiest of the three species. It is interesting to know that for more than two hundred years we have records of the Wood Wren in what are now the western suburbs of Sheffield. Francis Jessop of Sheffield sent an example of the Wood Wren to Willughby, and Ray published a description of it in his Ornithologia, one of the earliest works dealing with British birds. The Wood Wren is the most attached to the woods of all the three species, and its peculiar shivering “song” is a familiar sound from the tree-tops throughout the spring and summer. Lastly, we have the Chiffchaff, certainly the rarest and most local of all. In the south-west of England the reverse is the case, and there its monotonous cry may be heard from the close of March onwards to September. It does not, however, reach the northern shires until the first or second week in April, although we have a Sherwood Forest record for March. All these birds build more or less domed nests, usually on the ground, and often in woods (the Chiffchaff sometimes makes its nest some distance from the ground), the Willow Wren and the Chiffchaff lining theirs with feathers, but the Wood Wren contents itself with fine grass and hair. The Wood Wren is the latest to arrive towards the end of April, and departs the earliest in autumn; the Willow Wren leaves us in September, the Chiffchaff not unfrequently lingering on into October. It should be remarked that not only the Willow Wren but the Chiffchaff are not by any means confined to woods, but are equally common in gardens, orchards, hedgerows, and thickets.