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Page:Elwes1930MemoirsOfTravelSportAndNaturalHistory.djvu/64

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60
MEMOIRS OF TRAVEL

An account of this was published in the Ibis, for we were fortunate in having Mr. Benson, a well-known ornithologist of Copenhagen as our guide, and spent a very pleasant time with him and his assistant in Jutland. An isolated forest lying in the middle of a great tract of moorland was one of our best localities. Here Goshawks and Kites were common. The Goshawk makes a very large nest of beech twigs lined with lichen, and lays three or four green eggs, which are unlike those of any other bird of prey.

In another forest called Roldskov we were personally conducted by a very jolly old Danish forester on an Iceland pony to the eyries of the Black Stork, which, unlike its cousin the White Stork, is a very shy bird, and breeds in remote forests on trees. I took two nests myself on May 9th, one of which was in an old Sea Eagle’s nest thirty feet from the ground.

Perhaps the most interesting place to which we went in Denmark was a large extent of marsh and saltings near Tarm, in the Ringkjoping fiord. Here were abundance of Ruffs and Reeves, Pintail and Garganey. We were, however, too early for the Great Snipe, which breeds here in some numbers. Other good finds during my Danish trip were the nests of the Turnstone, the Red-necked Grebe and the Marsh Harrier. On our way home we stayed a few days in Holland, and visited the Horster Meer near Amsterdam, where the Spoonbill and Purple Heron breed in a strictly protected colony.