He is a curious little chap, the Solitary Snipe, and we used to call him
Tip-up. He delights to “see-saw” and “teeter” down a clay bank, with a
tiny “peep-po,” “peep-po,” just before he pokes in his long, slender
bill for food.
He is very tough, and possesses as many lives as the proverbial cat. I
have taken many a shot at him—fine sand-shot at that—and from a gun with
a record for scattering, and I never succeeded in knocking over but one
Tip-up while on a hunt for taxidermy specimens. I failed to secure even
this one, though he flopped over in the water and floated down upon the
surface of the shallows toward where I stood, knee-deep awaiting his
coming. He was as dead as any bird should have been after such a
peppering; yes, he was my prize at last, or so I thought as I reached
out my hand to lift his limp-looking little body from the water. He was
only playing possum after all. With a whirl of his wings and a shrill
“peep-po,” “peep-po,” he darted away and disappeared up stream and out
of sight beyond the alders. To add to my disappointment a red-headed
woodpecker began to pound out a tantalizing tune upon the limb of a dead
hemlock. No sand-shot could reach that fellow, desire him as much as I
might. Then a bold kingfisher, with a shrill, saucy scream, darted down
before me, grabbed a dace and sailed to a branch opposite to enjoy his
feast, well knowing, the rascal! that I had an unloaded gun and had
fired my last shell. How he knew this I am not able to say, but he did.
Wiser fellows in bird lore than I may be able to explain this. I cannot.
The Solitary Sandpiper is well named. He is always at home wherever
found, and always travels alone, be it upon the shelving rock-banks of a
river or the clay-banks of a rural stream. He possesses, after a
fashion, the gift of the chameleon and can moderately change the color
of his coat, or feathers, rather. When he “teeters” along a blue clay
bank he looks blue, and when he “see-saws” along brown or gray rocks he
looks gray or brown, as the case may be.
The city boy who spends his vacation in the rural parts and fishes for
dace, redfins or sunfish, knows the Solitary Sandpiper. To the country
boy he is an old acquaintance, for he has taken many a shot, with stone
or stick, at the spry little Tip-up, who never fails to escape scot free
to “peep-po,” “peep-po” at his sweet content.
H. S. Keller.
THE KNOT OR ROBIN SNIPE.
(_Tringa canutus._)
The Knot or Robin Snipe is a bird of several names, as it is also called
the Red-breasted Ash-colored Sandpiper, the Gray-back and the Gray
Snipe. It is quite cosmopolitan, breeding in the far north of both
hemispheres, but in winter migrating southward and wintering in the
climate of the southern United States and Central America. The Knot
belongs to the Snipe family (Scolopacidae), which includes one hundred
or more species, about forty-five of which are inhabitants of North
America. Nearly all the species breed in the higher latitudes of the
northern hemisphere. These birds frequent the shores of large bodies of
water and are seldom observed far from their vicinity. Their bills are
long and are used in seeking food in the soft mud of the shore.
The Knot visits the great lakes during its migrations and is frequently
observed at that time. Its food, which consists of the smaller
crustaceans and shells, can be as readily obtained on the shores of
these lakes as on those of the ocean, which it also follows.
Dr. Ridgway tells us that “Adult specimens vary individually in the
relative extent of the black, gray and reddish colors on the upper
parts; gray usually predominates in the spring, the black in midsummer.
Sometimes there is no rufous whatever on the upper surface. The cinnamon
color of the lower parts also varies in intensity.”
Little is known of the nest and eggs of the Knot owing to its retiring
habits at the nesting time and the fact that it breeds in the region of
the Arctic Circle, so little frequented by man. One authentic report,
that of Lieutenant A. W. Greely, describes a single egg that he
succeeded in obtaining near Fort Conger while commanding an expedition
to Lady Franklin Sound. This egg was a little more than an inch in
length and about one inch in diameter. Its color was a “light pea-green,
closely spotted with brown in small specks about the size of a pinhead.”
VIOLA BLANDA.
(Sweet White Violet.)
Serene the thrush’s song, all undisturbed,
Its rows of pearls, a marvel of completeness,
Then the soft drip of falling tears I heard,
Poor weeping bird, who envied so thy sweetness!
—Nelly Hart Woodworth.
[Illustration: ]