visitor, to be met with from April until the end of September in
suitable places throughout the British Islands. He is an exceeding
lively and restless little bird, running nimbly or flitting along
the margin of the water; when standing, perpetually bobbing his head
and jerking his tail, on which account he is named ‘fidler’ in some
districts; solitary in habit, or living with his mate only, choosing
for a home the most secluded spots by streams and meres. In the
southern half of England, where the localities that best suit him are
fewest, he is very thinly diffused; in Scotland, on the other hand, he
is most abundant. Seebohm writes of this sandpiper: ‘It is found in
the same localities as those frequented by the dipper. High up among
the mountains its melodious cry may be heard from the shingly margin
of the stream, or the bird may not unfrequently be seen perched on a
rock surrounded by water. Even here the sandpiper shows a partiality
for certain haunts. The dipper loves their wildest mood, and the more
they roll and toss over the rocky boulders, the more he seems at
home; but the sandpiper prefers their slow-running reaches and sandy,
driftwood-covered islets, where the shingly and oozy rush-grown banks
afford it the haunt it needs.’
The slight nest of moss and dried leaves is placed among coarse grass
or rushes, or in a hole or sheltered hollow in a bank near a stream.
Four pear-shaped eggs are laid, very large for the bird, reddish white
in ground-colour, spotted and speckled with dusky brown.
The sandpiper utters on the wing a clear musical note, thrice repeated;
and in the pairing season the male has a trilling note, or song,
emitted while hovering in the air. Both old and young birds are able to
swim with ease, and, to escape danger, dive as readily as a moorhen or
water-rail.
Green Sandpiper.
Helodromus ochropus.
Upper parts olive-brown glossed with green and spotted with white and
dusky; under parts white; tail white, the central feathers barred with
black. Length, nine and a quarter inches.
* * * * *
The green sandpiper, like many other members of its family, is a
visitor to the British Islands after the breeding season. This species
differs from others in coming earlier and departing later. Half a
century ago it was observed in Norfolk that the green sandpiper was to
be met with during nearly every month in the year. The discovery was
made later that it differs from other sandpipers in breeding in trees,
in old nests of other birds, in squirrels’ dreys, and on mossy trunks
and branches. On account of this singular habit its nest is rarely
found; but that it has bred, and does breed, in this country scarcely
admits of a doubt.
In continental Europe it is known to breed in Scandinavia, North and
Central Russia, and North Germany. The eggs are four in number, pale
greyish green in ground-colour, with small purple-brown spots and
markings.
The green sandpiper frequents inland watercourses and swamps in wooded
districts, and is excessively shy and wary in its habits; it flies
rapidly, and utters when on the wing its shrill, piping note, thrice
repeated.
Redshank.
Totanus calidris.
Summer plumage: upper parts pale brown closely streaked and barred with
umber; secondaries nearly white; rump white, with a few dusky flecks;
tail-feathers white barred with blackish; under parts white, streaked
on the neck and breast with umber; legs and feet orange-red. Winter
plumage: upper parts ash-colour; rump and under parts white, sparsely
streaked and spotted with grey on the neck and breast. The female is
slightly larger than the male. Length, eleven inches.
* * * * *
The redshank, although not so numerous as formerly, is still a
fairly common bird of the tidal flats and saltings on the east coast
of England, and, in smaller numbers, in all suitable localities in
Great Britain and Ireland. It is resident throughout the year, but is
most plentiful in autumn and winter, at which time its numbers are
increased by the arrival of migrants from northern Europe. Its food
consists of marine worms, insects, and small crustaceans, and when its
feeding-grounds are covered at flood-tide, it may be seen in close
flocks on the small, dry areas, waiting for the water to subside.
When thus congregated the birds are very loquacious, keeping up a
perpetual confused sound of many voices, which has been compared to the
chirruping concert of a flock of house-sparrows before settling down
to roost of an evening. When the tide goes out the flocks break up,
and the birds scatter in all directions to feed. The redshank begins
to breed about the end of May, in fens and inland marshes, and on the
saltings, out of reach of the tide.
The nest is a slight depression in the ground, with a few dried bents
and grass-blades for lining, or with no lining at all, and is in some
cases quite exposed; but it is more often placed among coarse grass,
or in the centre of a tussock, which conceals it from view. Four eggs
are laid, of a yellowish grey ground-colour, blotched and spotted
with purplish brown. When its breeding-haunts are approached the bird
displays the greatest excitement, and flies circling about high above
the intruder’s head; and at such times a peculiar manner of flight,
common to all the species of the genus Totanus, becomes very marked.
The flight is slow and somewhat wavering, with an occasional downward
stroke of the wings, which are much depressed, as of a duck about to
drop on to the water. While flying in this way it clamours loudly,
making the marsh ring with its shrill, piercing pipe, and at times
dashes down close to the intruder’s head, as if to intimidate him; and
if there should be young, or eggs about to hatch, it drops on to the
ground, and flutters along the surface like a wounded bird, in order
to draw the danger away. Most birds in the order which includes the
sandpipers, snipes, and plovers, make use of this device when their
young are in danger.
At all times the redshank is a vigilant and clamorous bird, and as
the meaning of its ringing alarm-note is understood by all waders and
waterfowl, it is heartily detested by the gunners on the sea-coast.
Greenshank.
Totanus canescens.
[Illustration: FIG. 106.--GREENSHANK. ⅙ natural size.]
Head and neck greyish white streaked with blackish brown; mantle and
secondaries nearly black; rump and tail-feathers white, the latter
mottled and barred with dusky brown; under parts white, streaked and
spotted with ash-brown; legs and feet olive-green. Length, fourteen
inches. In the winter plumage the upper parts are greyer and the under
parts pure white.
* * * * *
The greenshank is an annual visitor during the spring and autumn
migrations to the coasts and inland waters of Great Britain and
Ireland; but it comes in small numbers. It has long been known that a
number of pairs remain annually to breed in Scotland, and, according
to Mr. Harvie-Brown, its breeding-range is extending in that country.
Macgillivray wrote of this species: ‘Its habits are very similar to
those of the redshank, with which it associates in autumn. It is
extremely shy and vigilant.... Many individuals remain during the
summer, when they are to be found by the lakes in the interior.... At
that season it is easily discovered, for when you are, perhaps, more
than a quarter of a mile distant, it rises into the air with clamorous
cries, alarming all the birds in its neighbourhood, flies round the
place of its nest, now wheeling off to a distance, again advancing
towards you, and at intervals alighting by the edge of the lake, where
it continues its cries, vibrating its body all the while.’
The nest is often placed at some distance from the water. The four
eggs are of a warm stone-colour, spotted with brown and blotched with
purplish grey.
Whimbrel.
Numenius phæopus.
Crown dark brown, with broad pale streak down the middle; upper parts
like the curlew, but darker; axillaries white barred with brown. Length
of female, eighteen inches.
* * * * *
If it were our belief that the happiness of birds consisted in the
degree of interest they, as species, excite in us, it could be said
that the whimbrel suffers from his resemblance to the curlew. He is
in form and colouring a lesser curlew with a less strongly marked
individuality; ‘half-curlew’ and ‘jack-curlew,’ his two vernacular
names, really imply that he is only half as attractive as the bigger
bird. With us he is best known as an autumn and spring visitor,
breeding only in the Orkney and Shetland Islands. The migration
eastwards begins at the end of July, and the birds continue to pass
until September, flying rapidly and at a great height. Of the flocks
that alight to rest and feed on our coasts, a few birds remain through
the winter. The return migration begins in April, but the greatest
number of the migrants appear on our coasts about the beginning of
May. On account of their punctuality, the whimbrel is known in some
districts as the ‘May bird.’ In language and habits they resemble
curlews, but have shriller voices, a more rapid flight, are not so
excessively shy, and do not confine themselves so exclusively to
the sand-flats when feeding. Grass-grown saltings, low meadows, and
pasture-lands in the neighbourhood of the sea are visited by them. The
nest is placed on moors and heaths not far removed from the shore. A
slight hollow among the heather or coarse grass is lined with dead
stems and leaves, and four eggs are laid, in colour like those of the
curlew, but differing in size. During the breeding season the whimbrels
are extremely pugnacious, and attack the skuas, lesser black-backed
gulls, and other egg-stealing species, and chase them from their
nesting-ground with shrill, angry cries.
Common Curlew.
Numenius arquata.
General plumage reddish ash mottled with dusky spots; belly nearly
white, with dusky streaks; rump and tail-coverts white; tail-feathers
barred with dark brown. Length of the female, which is the larger,
twenty-one to twenty-six inches.
* * * * *
The curlew is the largest of its order in the British Islands; even the
large woodcock looks small besides him, and among diminutive stints
and sandpipers he is a veritable giant. An imperfect ibis in figure,
in a pale sandy brown dress with dusky mottlings, he is, perhaps, the
least handsome of the Limicolæ; in character he is one of the most
interesting. What marvellously keen senses, what unfailing wariness
and alertness must this large, inland-breeding species possess to keep
its hold on existence in so many localities in this populous country
in spite of incessant persecution! Most vigilant of birds, he is
not vigilant on his own account only. He is the unsleeping sentinel
of all the wild creatures that are pursued by man, warning them of
danger with piercing cries that none fail to understand. The redshank,
greenshank, and many other species, in this and other orders, are
equally vociferous in the presence of danger, and their warnings are
as promptly obeyed by all wild creatures that live with or near them;
but a curious feature about the curlew is that he appears to take an
intelligent interest in the welfare of beings not of his own species,
and that he is distressed if they fail to act on his signal. In
Yarrell’s ‘British Birds’ (4th edit. vol. iii.) Howard Saunders gives
a striking instance of this characteristic. He describes seeing one
of these birds, ‘after shrieking wildly over the head of a sleeping
seal, swoop down, and apparently flick with its wings the unsuspecting
animal, upon which the stalker was just raising his rifle.’ This, to
my mind, is a far more wonderful instance of the help-giving instinct
in the lower animals than that related by Edwards of Banff, in which
a number of terns swooped down upon one of their number which he
had wounded and was pursuing, and, taking its wings in their beaks,
raised it, and bore it away out to sea beyond his reach. The case of
the curlew reminds us rather of the action of the rhinoceros-bird in
waking the rhinoceros on the appearance of an enemy; but between curlew
and seal there is no such thing as commensalism, and no tie, excepting
the common knowledge that they are living creatures, and must fly for
life at the approach of man, their deadliest enemy, on account of his
superior cunning and his power to slay them at long distances.
[Illustration: OYSTER-CATCHERS. RINGED PLOVER. LITTLE STINT.
CURLEW.]
During a greater part of the year the curlew is a shore-bird, seeking
its food on the sand-flats which become covered at high water. When the
tide overflows the flats the birds go inland, often to a distance of
several miles from the sea, and wait there until the tide turns. They
appear to know just when this occurs, however far from the shore they
may be, and, rising and calling to each other, set out on their return,
to arrive at the exact time when feeding may begin. It is during these
journeys to and fro between the sea and the moors that the curlew looks
at his best when, seen at a moderate distance, he passes in small
flocks, disposed in the form of a wedge, or letter V, his sharp-pointed
wings and long, ibis-like beak clearly outlined against the blue sky.
To most lovers of nature and wild bird life the voice of the curlew
is his principal attraction. He is very loquacious, and his ordinary
cry of two notes, from which he takes his name, is singularly clear,
far-reaching, and wild in character. His night cries have given rise
to some curious and gloomy superstitions in Scotland, where the curlew
is called ‘whaup.’ According to Yarrell, the bird is a ‘long-nebbit
thing,’ from which the Highlander prays to be delivered, classing it
with ‘witches and warlocks.’ In the same work we read: ‘Saxby says that
the Shetlanders regard with horror the very idea of using so uncanny a
bird as food; in fact, a visitor who did so was afterwards alluded to,
almost in a whisper, as “the man that ate the whaup.”’ Long may the
‘long-nebbit things’ continue to exist, to delight and invigorate us
with their wild voices!
In spring--early in April as a rule--the curlews begin to forsake
their feeding-grounds on the sandbanks and go inland to breed; but
some unpaired or non-breeding birds remain through the summer by
the sea. Wild extensive moors are its favourite summer haunts. ‘Its
breeding-range,’ Seebohm says, ‘is similar to that of the red grouse
and ring-ouzel.’ Its nesting-place, as a rule, is on the flat and boggy
parts of the moor, and the nest is not unfrequently placed among reeds
or rushes. The three or four eggs are olive-green, blotched and spotted
with dark brown and dusky green. The young birds when hatched have
short, straight, plover-like bills.
* * * * *
The family Scolopacidæ, which comprises the phalaropes, avocet, snipes,
sandpipers, godwits, the curlew, and whimbrel, numbers thirty-four
(so-called) British species. Eighteen have been fully described,
including the ruff, now extinct as a breeder, and fallen to the
position of a mere straggler in this country. The ruff is one of three
interesting and handsome species in this family of birds which have
been extirpated in England during the present century. Another is the
avocet (_Recurvirostra avocetta_), a singular wader, conspicuous
and beautiful in black and white plumage, with a long bill, curved
upwards. It bred in large numbers in fens and marshes in the eastern
countries; but since about 1825, when it finally ceased to visit its
old haunts in summer, it has been known only as a rare straggler. The
third extirpated species is the fine black-tailed godwit (_Limosa
melanura_), which bred annually in Norfolk and the neighbouring
county until about 1835. It is now a visitor on migration, in very
small numbers, to the east coast. The bar-tailed godwit, which has
never bred in the British Islands, also appears occasionally in
small numbers during migration. It breeds in northern Europe. The
black-winged stilt, which resembles the avocet in its black and white
dress, but has longer legs and a straight bill, is a rare straggler
from southern Europe. Of several species of sandpipers that appear as
stragglers on our coasts during migration, there are two that have some
claim to be regarded as British species. One is the wood-sandpiper
(_Totanus glareola_), which comes nearest to the green sandpiper
in size, colour, and general appearance. It appears on the east and
south coasts in autumn, in small flocks composed of young birds.
The wood-sandpiper is known to have bred on one occasion in this
country--at Prestwich Car, in Northumberland, in 1853. The second
species is the spotted redshank, a rare and irregular visitor during
migration, chiefly to the eastern counties. Its winter plumage is
ash-grey above and white beneath; in summer it differs from all other
sandpipers in its dark hue, the general colour being sooty black, the
upper parts studded with triangular spots of pure white. It breeds in
northern Europe in wooded situations, and is partial to burnt grounds,
where its dark plumage assimilates in colour to the charred wood and
blackened earth. Like the redshank, it is, when breeding, exceedingly
vigilant and noisy when approached.
Eight species, all rare stragglers, remain to be mentioned: the
broad-billed sandpiper, pectoral sandpiper, Bonaparte’s sandpiper,
American stint, buff-breasted sandpiper, Bartram’s sandpiper,
red-breasted snipe, and Esquimaux curlew. With the exception of the
first, which breeds in northern Europe and winters in Africa, these
are all American species, breeding in or near the arctic regions, and
migrating in autumn to South America, in some cases as far south as
Patagonia.
Roughly speaking, we may say that, of the thirty-four species of the
snipe family described in most ornithological works as ‘British,’
seventeen or eighteen are breeders in or annual visitants to this
country; six are occasional visitors--two or three of these are
perhaps, annual visitors, but in very small numbers; and the remaining
ten are all rare stragglers.
Arctic Tern.
Sterna macrura.
Bill blood-red; legs and feet coral-red; head and nape black; mantle
pearl-grey; rump and tail white; under parts paler pearl-grey. Length,
fourteen and a half inches.
* * * * *
The tern has been called a sea-swallow, and he is certainly
swallow-like in his slender figure, sharply forked tail, and aërial
habits; but he is built on more graceful lines, with proportionately
longer wings, and in his white and pearl-grey plumage is the more
beautiful bird. The blood-red hue of the beak in the arctic tern
gives that touch of bright colour which adds so much to the beauty
of a species otherwise wholly black or white; it intensifies a black
plumage, as we see in the blackbird and chough, and makes the white
plumage seem more immaculate in its whiteness. The flight of the tern
is unlike that of any other bird, whether of the sea or land: it is
more airy, and suited to the pale, slender, aërial figure; buoyant and
slightly wavering, it reminds one a little of the high, apparently
uncertain, flight of some large-winged butterfly; and it is in perfect
harmony, not only with the slimmer form, but with the idea of a being
whose life is passed amid wind and mist and fluctuating wave. It is
a rare pleasure to watch a number of these terns feeding in an inlet
or bay, where the spectator can sit or lie on a cliff or jutting rock
near to and on a level with the birds. They are not concerned at his
presence, but, intent on their prey, pass and re-pass before him so
near that their round, brilliant eyes may be distinctly seen. The
blood-red, dagger-like beak is pointed downwards almost constantly as
the bird gazes on the water thirty or forty yards below. All at once
the buoyant flight is arrested, the bird hangs motionless in mid-air,
the snow-white, forked tail expanded and depressed, the slow-moving,
wavering wings rapidly vibrated. In such an attitude he reminds
you less of a windhover than of the humming-bird, when that little
feathered fairy is seen hovering motionless _above_ the flowers
on which its eyes are fixed. Suddenly the wings partly close, and the
white figure drops plumb down, with such force as to send up a shower
of foam and spray as it strikes on and disappears into the water, to
emerge in a moment or two with a small fish in its bill.
The terns, of which there are five breeding-species in the British
Islands, are all migrants, and come to us in spring. The arctic tern
ranges farthest north: it is the most common species on the coasts of
Scotland and its islands; its most southern breeding-station is at
the Farnes, off the coast of Northumberland. It breeds in communities
sometimes numbering thousands of birds. The nests are placed very
near each other, often within half a yard, among scanty grass and
herbage, or on the shingle and sand of the beach, and sometimes on
the bare rock. Two or three eggs are laid, greatly varying in their
ground-colour, olive, buff, greyish brown, stone, and other tints
being found; and the spots and blotches of blackish brown and grey
may be few or many. The young birds are at first covered with a
yellowish down with dark brown spots, and are very active. When the
nesting-ground is entered the birds rise up, and hover in a dense cloud
above the intruder’s head, their united powerful screams producing an
extraordinary noise, like that of the sea on a shingled beach when the
withdrawing wave drags back the pebbles with shrill and grating sounds.
In September and October the arctic tern migrates to warmer regions.
Common Tern.
Sterna fluviatilis.
[Illustration: FIG. 107.--COMMON TERN. ⅐ natural size.]
Bill, legs, and feet orange-red; entire plumage as in the arctic tern,
except the lower parts, which are more nearly pure white. Length,
fourteen and a quarter inches.
* * * * *
So nearly alike are the arctic and common terns that it is hard,
well-nigh impossible, in fact, to distinguish them when they are
observed flying about in company. In size, manner of flight, language,
and general appearance, they are identical. On a close examination
the common tern is found to be slightly less slender in build, its
under parts dull white instead of pale grey, its beak tipped with
black and coral-red, instead of blood-red. It is doubtless owing to
their similarity that the two species associate freely together at all
times, and are often to be found breeding side by side. But while the
arctic tern is most common in the north, from the Shetlands, Orkneys,
and Hebrides, to the coast of Northumberland on the one side of the
country, and of Lancashire on the other, the common tern is common
only on the coasts south of these two points. The nest is a slight
depression, sometimes with a little dry grass for lining, placed on
the shingle of the beach; the three eggs are yellowish stone, grey, or
olive colour, spotted and blotched with dark brown and grey.
Roseate Tern.
Sterna dougalli.
Bill black, orange-red at the base in the breeding season; legs and
feet red; head and upper parts the same as in the arctic and common
terns, except that the mantle is a paler pearl-grey; lower parts white
suffused with rose. Length, fifteen inches and a quarter.
* * * * *
This species differs from the two already described in its slimmer body
and greater length of tail, and in its shorter and narrower wings.
It also differs in the delicate rose-colour suffusing or tinging the
white under-plumage; but this faint exquisite hue is seen only when the
bird is in the hand. On the wing, unless very near, it appears white
and pale grey like the common tern, and only an accustomed eye can
distinguish it among the others by its slightly different shape. It
may be more easily recognised by its short, constantly repeated note,
which is more musical than that of the other species. Besides this
short, excited note, it has the long, somewhat guttural, and gull-like
cry common to all the terns. It breeds only on islands, and Howard
Saunders, our best authority on the birds of this order, says that it
is more ‘intolerant of interference’ than other terns: hence many of
its old breeding-stations on the British coasts have been successively
abandoned during the last half-century owing to egg-collecting, and
the bird is now becoming so rare that its extinction as a British
species at no distant date is feared by ornithologists. In the north
of England, and at various places on the coasts of Scotland, a few
pairs still breed in company with the common and arctic terns. The
nest is a slight depression in the sand and gravel, and two or three
eggs are laid, creamy white or buff-colour, blotched and clouded with
bluish grey and rich brown. As soon as the young have been reared the
breeding-ground is abandoned, and the migration southwards begins.
Little Tern.
Sterna minuta.
Bill orange-yellow tipped with black; legs and feet orange; crown and
nape black; forehead and stripe over the eye white; mantle pearl-grey;
tail and under parts white. Length, eight inches.
* * * * *
[Illustration:
_PLATE XIV._