The road now becomes bordered by elms on either side, forming an
irregular avenue. Almost every elm in spring has its chaffinch loudly
challenging. The birdcatchers are aware that it is a frequented resort,
and on Sunday mornings four or five of them used to be seen in the
course of a mile, each with a call bird in a partly darkened cage, a
stuffed dummy, and limed twigs. In the cornfields on either hand
wood-pigeons are numerous in spring and autumn. Up to April they come
in flocks, feeding on the newly sown grain when they can get at it, and
varying it with ivy berries, from the ivy growing up the elms. By
degrees the flocks break up as the nesting begins in earnest.

Some pair and build much earlier than others; in fact, the first egg
recorded is very little to be depended on as an indication. Particular
pairs (of many kinds of birds) may have nests, and yet the species as a
species may be still flying in large packs. The flocks which settle in
these fields number from one to two hundred. Rooks, wood-pigeons, and
tame white pigeons often feed amicably mixed up together; the white tame
birds are conspicuous at a long distance before the crops have risen, or
after the stubble is ploughed.

I should think that the corn farmers of Surrey lose more grain from the
birds than the agriculturists whose tenancies are a hundred miles from
London. In the comparatively wild or open districts to which I had been
accustomed before I made these observations I cannot recollect ever
seeing such vast numbers of birds. There were places, of course, where
they were numerous, and there were several kinds more represented than
is the case here, and some that are scarcely represented at all. I have
seen flocks of wood-pigeons immensely larger than any here; but then it
was only occasionally. They came, passed over, and were gone. Here the