War and Migration It seems that war years (long famous
among vine-growers) have a special reputation among observers of birds. They seem to promote migration, which incidentally is a better word than evacuation. It is stated in the Sussex Magazine, which is still undefeated by the war, that a number of new records were made in tom, in regard, for example, to that rapidly increasing species, the Gadwell duck. More recent records from that bird-haunted county prove the considerable journeys of heron across the Channel. This year has been notorious more for the arrival of hordes of butterfly than of birds, but the movements of duck as well as some other birds has been eccentric. Seabirds seem to have come further inland. In my neighbourhood curlew are now to be seen among the plover, and the sight is new. They are far from being "dreary gleams." If the autumn call is melancholy, the spring cry is to my ears the most liquid in the chorus.
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