BIRD PARASITES.
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sin,—We always have a large colony of swifts in this town, the stone slates of many of the roofs affording them convenient places for nesting. They left us early this year (I think on the evening of the 9th instant), but yesterday I picked up a young one, fairly well fledged but unable to fly, apparently left behind and starving. On this bird I found two large parasites, larger than sheep "ticks," bluish-green in colour and very active. I thought at first that they were ticks, but on a second glance I saw that they had rudimentary wings and only six legs, so that like sheep " ticks " they are not really ticks, but true insects. What surprised me was that so small a bird as a swift should have so large a parasite. Can any of your readers, better acquainted with ornithology and entomology than I am, say if swifts are usually troubled with such pests ?
am, Sir, &c.,
Woodlands, Witney, August 14th. Cues. W. EARLY.
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