35.  REED WARBLER. Acrocephalus streperus, Vieillot.  French, “Rousserolle effarvatte,” “Bec-fin des roseaux.”—­I did not find out the Reed Warbler as a Guernsey bird till this year (1878), though it is a rather numerous but very local summer visitant.  But Mr. MacCulloch put me on the right track, as he wrote to me to say—­“The Reed Warbler builds in the Grand Mare.  I have seen several of their curious hanging nests brought from there.”  This put me on the right scent, and I went to the place as soon as I could, and found parts of it a regular paradise for Reed Warblers, and there were a considerable number there, who seemed to enjoy the place thoroughly, climbing to the tops of the long reeds and singing, then flying up after some passing insect, or dropping like a stone to the bottom of the reed-bed if disturbed or frightened.  On my first visit to the Grand Mare I had not time to search the reed-beds for nests.  But on going there a second time, on June 17, with Colonel l’Estrange, we had a good search for nests, and soon found one with four eggs in it which were quite fresh.  This nest was about three feet from the ground, tied on to four reeds,[9] and, as usual, having no support at the bottom, was made entirely of long dry bents of rather coarse grass, and a little of the fluff of the cotton plant woven amongst the bents outside, but none inside.  We did not find any other nests in the Grand Mare, though we saw a great many more birds; the reeds, however, were very thick and tall, high over our heads, so that when we were a few feet apart we could not see each other, and the place was full of pitfalls with deep water in them, which were very difficult to be seen and avoided.  Many of the nests, I suspect, were amongst the reeds which were growing out of the water.  Subsequently, on July the 12th, I found another Reed Warbler’s nest amongst some reeds growing by Mr. De Putron’s pond near the Vale Church; this nest, which was attached to reeds of the same kind as those at the Grand Mare, growing out of water about a foot deep:  it was about the same height above the water that the other was from the ground; it had five eggs in it hard sat.  There were one or two pairs more breeding amongst these reeds, though I could not very well get at the place without a boat, but the birds were very noisy and vociferous whenever I got near their nests, as were the pair whose nest I found.  There were also a few pairs in some reed-beds of the same sort near L’Eree.

These are all the places in which I have been able to find the Reed Warbler in Guernsey.  I have not found it myself in Alderney, but Mr. Gallienne, in his remarks published with Professor Ansted’s list, says:—­“I have put the Reed Wren as doubtful for Guernsey, but I have seen the nest of this bird found at Alderney.”  In the list itself it is marked as belonging to Guernsey, Alderney, and Sark.