James Parsons Burkitt (1870-1959): activities and natural history of a renowned Irish amateur ornithologist

Between 1906 and the mid-1950s fames Parsons Burkitt, a mathematician and engineer by training, kept a notebook in which he recorded his observations of birds. Analysis of the notes gives information about his bird-watching activities. He made observations principally in County Fermanagh and, before he retired as County Surveyor in 1940, he availed of opportunities provided by his official duties to indulge his hobby. Burkitts interest in birds developed from shooting and egg-collecting, and culminated in detailed recording of breeding behaviour and song. 130 species are accounted for, but only a very few notes relate to the garden robin, which was the subject of his famous field-study between 1924 and 1926.