Eurasian Curlews thermalling On 27th April 1991, at Newquay, Cornwall, I watched two small groups of Eurasian Curlews Mumenius arquata fly in from the west and land on the lawns beside the Headland Hotel. There was broken stratocumulus cloud based at about 800 m, with a light easterly wind and a surface temperature of about 15В°C. The 34 curlews then took off together and flew into the wind until they met a thermal over Newquay harbour, when they began soaring upwards in a tight right-handed spiral. They flew on extended wings with only occasional 'positioning' flaps, looking remarkably like ibises (Threskiornithidae). The whole flock remained in the thermal, which drifted westwards across Fistral Bay and out to sea, by which time the curlews had been joined by a few immature gulls (Laridae) and were almost at die base of the broken cloud. JOHN STEWART-SMITH 24 Cameton Close, Crantock, Newquay, Cornwall TR8 5RYM i s t l e T h r u s h a l a r m - c a l l t e r r o r i s i n g c a t The well-known rattling alarm-call of the Mistle Thrush Turdus viscivorus (described in detail in BWP vol. 5, pages 1020-1021) is not only a sign of agitation or anxiety, but also serves to attract die attention of a potential predator, and thereby distracts it from the thrush's nest or young. Observations in my rural garden at Blunham, Bedfordshire, in the summer of 1991 and