On the anatomy and habits of the water-ousel (Cinclus aquaticus) / by Edwards Crisp.

  • Edwards Crisp
Date:
[1865]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the anatomy and habits of the water-ousel (Cinclus aquaticus) / by Edwards Crisp. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    taken from under a stone. Mr. Gould thinks that, by destroying insects and their larvae that may attack the ova and fry of fishes, these birds may do great service. Mr. Macgillivray found beetles and water shells (Lymnea and Ancy- lus) and the larvae of Ephemera, Phryyanea, and other aquatic insects. Sir W. Jardine, in his 4 Birds of Great Britain,’ says, “ In one part of Scotland, sixpence per head is given for these birds. In another district, 548 were killed in three years.” He adds, “ The ova of any kind of fish we have never detected in the stomach or intestines ; nor do we think that they habitually frequent the places where the spawn would be deposited; and if they did, we would deem it almost impossible that they could reach it after it was covered in the spawning-bed,” &c. So that I hope we may fairly acquit this interesting little bird of the depredations of which it has so often been accused; but I hope that we shall ere long see the Water-Ousel, with the Little Grebe (Podiceps minor), in the Society’s fish-house, where a better oppor- tunity will be afforded of learning its habits. As is well known, this bird has been variously classed by different writers. Mr. Gould, in the work before quoted, says he regards Cinclus as one of the isolated forms of ornithology, and that it has some remote alliance with the genera Troglodytes and Scytalopus and their allies. In my next communication I hope, by a careful comparison of the skeleton of this bird with those of the other Merulidce, to come to a more definite conclusion on this subject.
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