the spring; it has always been a rare straggler on the Atlantic coast
at this season; and even as far east as Ohio it rarely occurs. Its main
route is through the prairie regions west of the Mississippi River. I
have seen what was probably the last of the migration, during the first
week of May, along the coastal prairies of Texas, and have watched
the late spring flight in Saskatchewan during the last week in May;
probably I missed the heaviest part of the flight in both cases. On May
26 to 28, 1917, while driving about Quill Lake, Saskatchewan, I had a
good chance to observe a considerable flight of these beautiful birds,
all apparently in full spring plumage. The flocks appeared from the
southward during the early forenoon, flying swiftly in ever-changing
formations, rising to a height of 30 or 40 feet and then sweeping low
close to the ground. They all seemed to follow the same course over the
burnt-over prairies and the freshly plowed and harrowed lands near the
shore of the lake. Occasionally a flock would stop and scatter about to
feed; their black bellies and golden-spangled backs were surprisingly
inconspicuous on the black ground and among the yellow stubble. They
were very shy and restless, constantly on the move, and if followed
up too closely they were on the wing again and soon disappeared over
the northern horizon. It was almost impossible to approach them on
foot when they were on the ground, though a flock would occasionally
fly by within gunshot. One that I shot on the ground was 75 paces
away, measured distance. Some of the flocks were accompanied by a few
buff-breasted sandpipers.
Professor Rowan (1926) says that in Alberta:
The arrival of this species at our lake is precipitate,
for there may be none to-day and hundreds to-morrow. The
flocks would appear to arrive by night, for they are there
at daybreak, when one usually takes the first walk around.
They are not birds of the shore line in the spring, but
like the buff-breasted sandpiper, they seem nevertheless
chiefly to frequent country adjacent to some large lake.
This, together with their mode of arrival, in considerable
flocks and evidently at night, suggests that they have
traveled a considerable distance from their last stopping
place. They stay with us some days and then go in the
manner in which they came, _en masse_. We have no records
earlier than May 8 when the birds may first be expected,
but the main contingent arrives nearer the 16th or 17th,
while by the 23d or 24th they have usually all gone. Their
period with us is therefore brief as compared with the
majority of shore birds.
The remainder of the journey is quickly completed, for, at Point
Barrow, John Murdoch (1885) says:
They are among the earlier waders to arrive, as stragglers
generally appear about the 20th to the 25th of May, before
there is much bare ground. In 1882 a small party in full
breeding plumage, and apparently all males, arrived May 21,
but no more arrived until June 11. The tundra was at this
time bare only along the edge of the beach, and the ice and
snow was not yet gone from the lagoons. This party remained
in nearly the same place for a couple of weeks, feeding on
small red worms which they found in marshy spots, and all
but two of them were taken, although they were very wild.
Along through the first and second week in June they
continued to arrive in small parties, and from that time on
are quite plenty scattered in pairs and threes all over the
tundra. They are very wild and difficult to approach, and
very noisy. In addition to their ordinary well-known call
note, they have in the breeding season, a loud but very
melodious cry of _tud’ling!_ many times repeated, uttered
as the bird flies along rather high, with long slow strokes
of the wings.
_Nesting._--Roderick MacFarlane was very successful in finding nests
of golden plover in the Anderson River region and other parts of the
Arctic barren grounds. He sent a large number of eggs to Washington
and I find in his notes references to over 120 nests, on which some
data were given, mostly very brief. He says that “golden plover were
in great abundance in the barren grounds, as well as along the Arctic
coast. They seldom or never nested in the wooded country, though a
few specimens were found on the open plains or commons, which occur
on the borders of that tract.” Some of the nests on the Arctic coast
were “near the beach” or even “within a few yards of the sea water.”
The nests were evidently mere hollows in the open tundra, lined with
dead leaves; there were no attempts at concealment, but the protective
coloring of the eggs made them very difficult to find. He says that
“when a nest of this plover is approached the female invariably gets
off it at a quick pace, between a run and a walk, which it continues
at short intervals until the intruder be attracted to a distance
therefrom, when it flies away. The male generally joins its mate in
this.” On a few occasions, when surprised, the bird fluttered away
for a short distance, but soon began to run as usual. Often the bird
left the nest when the men were 100 yards away from it. Once when
they had hunted in vain for an hour and a half, they retired and
watched. “After a few minutes she came on at a cautious run, stopping
frequently and making occasional excursions in different directions,”
and finally settled on the eggs. They found that several of the party
had repeatedly passed quite close to, and one had nearly trodden on the
eggs. Watching the bird return to the nest, which she generally does
within a few minutes, seems to be the best way of finding a nest.
Of the nests found near Point Barrow, Mr. Murdoch (1885) says:
The nest is exceedingly hard to find, although it is not
concealed at all, but is simply a depression in the bare
black clayey tundra lined with a little dry moss. The only
vegetation on this part of the tundra is white and grayish
moss, which harmonizes so extraordinarily with the peculiar
blotching of the eggs that it is almost impossible to see
them unless one knows exactly where to look. A favorite
nesting site is on the high banks of the gullies or small
streams. No nests were ever found in the grass or in swampy
ground.
W. Sprague Brooks (1915) found only one nest near Demarcation Point,
Alaska, of which he says:
I found this nest on June 25 with three eggs about
one-quarter incubated. The male was on the nest. It took
several days to find the nest, for the bird would leave
when I was a long way off and begin running about and
feeding as though it had nothing else to do. By placing
a lump of tundra each day where I first saw the bird I
eventually found her nest, a mere depression in some
greenish moss which, with scattered bits of brown dead
vegetation, harmonized extraordinarily with the eggs.
When the bird saw that its nest was finally discovered it
showed great distress and ran toward me until about 20
paces distant, where it stood tottering as if about to
fall, with one wing raised over its back. In a short time
the bird, with tail down and a wing dragging, would walk
slowly from me. As I never followed, the bird would return
and totter a while, repeating the same performance several
times until secured for the proper identification of the
eggs.
_Eggs._--The golden plover’s normal set is of four eggs, but MacFarlane
collected many sets of three and one of five. These are quite uniformly
ovate pyriform in shape and have only a slight gloss. The ground colors
vary from “cinnamon buff” or “light pinkish cinnamon” to “light buff,”
“cartridge buff,” or “cream color,” hence more buffy or less olivaceous
or grayish than in eggs of the black-bellied plover. They are boldly
and profusely marked, more or less irregularly, with large and small
spots and irregular blotches of very dark browns or black, “Vandyke
brown,” “clove brown,” and brownish black. Sometimes there are a few
underlying small spots of “drab gray.” The measurements of 143 eggs in
the United States National Museum average 47.5 by 32.5 millimeters; the
eggs showing the four extremes measure =56= by 31, 50 by =34.5=, =42=
by 34, and 46 by =30= millimeters. Both sexes incubate. The period of
incubation for the European species is said to be 27 days.
_Plumages._--In the downy young golden plover the forehead, crown,
back, wings, rump, and thighs are mottled with bright “wax yellow” and
black, the yellow being mainly at the tips of the down. A broad patch
under the eye, extending back to the ears, and the chin, are white; a
spot in front of the eye and an indistinct band above it, the hind neck
and the throat are yellowish white, the hind neck being mottled with
black; a broad band from the lores to the nape is pale yellow, mottled
with black. The remaining under parts are grayish white.
In fresh juvenal plumage, on the breeding grounds, the crown and all
the upper parts are brownish black, the feathers tipped or heavily
notched with bright yellow, “light cadmium” to “buff-yellow,” brightest
on the rump; the wing coverts are pale sepia, notched paler yellow
or white; the breast is pale drab, barred, spotted or notched with
pale dusky and dull yellow, “mustard yellow” to “Naples yellow”;
the belly is white, partially barred with pale dusky; and the tail
feathers are sepia, indistinctly barred with darker sepia and tipped
with dull yellow. By the time that young birds reach us on migration
in September, the bright yellows of the upper parts have faded
considerably, and the duller yellow on the breast has disappeared
entirely. This plumage is not molted until after the birds leave us;
late in the fall, November or later, a partial molt of the body plumage
produces the first winter plumage, which can be distinguished from
the adult only by the juvenal tail and some retained scapulars and
tertials. What happens the next spring we have not the material to
show. Most of the birds that we see here in the spring are in fully
adult nuptial plumage, but I have seen quite a number of birds, some
taken on their breeding grounds, that showed, more or less, old, worn,
winter plumage; these may be young birds in their first nuptial plumage.
The postnuptial molt of adults begins with the body molt in August,
the new pale drab and whitish feathers of the winter plumage appearing
first in the black under parts; this molt continues through September
while the birds are migrating. But the primaries are not molted until
winter, November to February. In winter the plumage of the under parts
is very pale drab, shading off to almost pure white on the chin and
belly; the adult tail is irregularly barred with dusky and grayish
or yellowish white; the feathers of the mantle are brownish black,
narrowly edged with yellow, not notched or spotted as in spring. The
prenuptial molt of the body plumage begins in March and lasts until
May in some individuals; many old winter feathers are often found in
breeding birds, especially in the wing coverts, scapulars, tertials
and back. The beautiful nuptial plumage is too well known to need
description here.
_Food._--The favorite feeding grounds of the golden plover are rolling
pasture lands where the grass is short or scanty, prairies, plains,
plowed lands and occasionally open sand or mud flats. Its food consists
almost entirely of insects, chiefly Orthoptera which abound in the
pasture lands. It is said to feed mainly on grasshoppers, but George
H. Mackay (1891), who is very familiar with it, says that he has never
seen it eat any, though he has watched it through a strong glass near
at hand. He says:
I have also examined the stomachs of a good many which
I have shot on Nantucket, and have never found any
grasshoppers in them, nor in fact anything but crickets
(which seem their principal food there), grass seeds, a
little vegetable matter, like seaweed, coarse sand, and
small stones. I have also frequently shot them with the
vent stained purple, probably from the berries of the
_Empetrum nigrum_.
They must find abundant food in the north, for they are always very
fat when they arrive here. The large numbers of grasshoppers, locusts,
crickets, and other insects that they destroy make them very beneficial
birds to the farmers of the west, where they also do much good by
eating the grubs, cutworms, and wireworms on freshly plowed lands,
their favorite resorts in spring. On the shores and open flats they
find some small mollusks and crustaceans. The crops of two which Lucien
M. Turner collected in northern Ungava were filled with ripening
berries of _Empetrum nigrum_ and remains of spiders. Hantzsch found
them eating beetles and caterpillars on Baffin Island.
_Behavior._--The flight of the golden plover is exceedingly swift,
strong and protracted, as it must be to make such wonderful migrations.
Over the prairies the flocks sweep along in compact and ever changing
formations, skimming close to the ground at times and then rising high
in the air, frequently whistling as they go. William Brewster (1925)
has described their flight, as seen at Umbagog Lake, Maine, as follows:
They habitually flew faster than any of the other waders
and perhaps more swiftly than any of the ducks except
the hooded merganser. Their long, pointed wings, lifting
high and cutting deep at each stroke, beat rapidly and
ceaselessly, yet so easily and smoothly as to indicate
comparatively slight muscular effort. If they happened
to pass near at hand or overhead their flight was likely
to impress one as having not only exceeding speed but
irresistible momentum, also as of solid projectiles,
hurtling through the air. Seen at a distance they appear
to be moving more slowly and looked not unlike passenger
pigeons.
When preparing to alight the flocks often perform extensive evolutions,
circling and turning, as they sweep about over the ground, as if
selecting a satisfactory landing place. When a suitable spot is chosen,
they all alight in a compact bunch, raising their wings high above
their backs before folding them, and soon scatter over the ground to
feed. When on the ground they are very active, running rapidly and
gracefully, stopping suddenly to look around, with head held high, and
then striking quickly at some morsel of food. Mr. Mackay (1891) says:
When scattered over considerable ground, as is usual after
they have been any length of time on their feeding ground,
every bird apparently on its own hook, if alarmed, a
note is sounded; they then rise so as to meet as soon as
possible at a common center, which gained, away they go in
a compact body. During the middle of the day they are fond
of seeking the margins of ponds, where they sit quietly
for a long time, if undisturbed. When disturbed they are
almost certain to return, in a short time, to the same spot
from which they have been started, that is, if they have
been resting or feeding there any length of time. When
suspicious, it is very difficult to approach, decoy, or
call them; if not harassed, they are as a rule quite tame
and gentle, and can be easily driven up to with horse and
wagon.
_Voice._--John T. Nichols says in his notes:
The flight note of the golden plover in migration is a
far-reaching _que-e-e-a_, with a quaver in the middle and
falling at the end. Though with a thrilling plover quality
it at the same time has an affinity to the killdeer’s
cry, being less mellow and whistled than the note of the
blackbelly, which it also suggests, reversed.
Mr. Mackay (1891) says that when these birds are approaching decoys
every bird seems to be whistling “a note like _coodle, coodle,
coodle_.” Mr. Forbush (1912) calls its note “a plaintive _too-lee-e_,”
or “a bright whistle, _queep-quee-lee-leep_.” Others have given
different renderings of some of the above notes.
_Field marks._--The bird with which the golden plover is most likely to
be confused is the black-bellied plover, but the golden is a smaller,
more slender, bird, with a generally darker appearance. When seen in
flight the tone of the tail is very dark and the axillars, under the
wings, are grey, whereas in the black-bellied the tail is decidedly
whitish and the axillars are very conspicuously black in all plumages;
furthermore the black-bellied has a conspicuous light wing bar, which
is lacking in the golden. The notes of the two are quite different.
When in hand the golden is seen to have no hind toe. Mr. Nichols
suggests that the golden has a swifter, more buoyant flight, suggestive
of the killdeer.
_Fall._--Mr. Murdoch (1885) refers to the beginning of the migration as
follows:
The nesting season continues till the first or middle
of July, about which time the adults begin to collect
in flocks, feeding together around the ponds on the
higher tundra, associated sometimes with a few knots or a
struggling curlew. The old birds leave for the south about
the end of July, and no more plovers are to be seen until
about the middle of August, when the young, who heretofore
have been keeping out of sight, scattered over the tundra,
gather into flocks, and for several days are quite plenty
on the dryer hills and banks, after which they depart.
Stragglers may be seen up to the end of August.
The main trend of the fall migration is southeastwards, mainly west and
south of Hudson Bay, but perhaps across it also, to the Atlantic coast,
mostly north of New England. In favorable weather the flight is over
the ocean from Nova Scotia to South America over, or to the eastward
of, Bermuda, and the Lesser Antilles. Mr. Clark (1905) figures out that
this is the course they would take, if they flew with a beam wind,
across the prevailing winds. Of their course after landing in British
Guiana, he says:
From this point their course is not accurately known;
but if we apply this theory, they would follow down the
northeastern tributaries of the Amazons until they came
within the influence of the southeast trades, which would
carry them southwest, over central Amazonia toward Peru and
Bolivia. Somewhat northwest of the Matto Grosso region, the
birds would come under the influence of the easterly winds
on the southern border of the trades, which would turn them
south, and gradually (as they became more northeasterly)
southeast, which would bring the plover into the prairie
region of the Argentine. Here the prevailing westerlies
of the pampas region would be felt, and the birds would,
under their influence, continue down the eastern part of
Patagonia toward Tierra del Fuego.
To add strength to his theory he says that there are specimens in the
British Museum from Mount Roraima and the Maroni River, Surinam, and
from Peru taken in September and October.
Some birds on the fall migration wander as far north and east as Baffin
Island and northeastern Labrador. Lucien M. Turner refers in his notes
to several adults which he saw and two which he collected, near the
mouth of the Koksoak River, between July 24 and August 19, 1882; and I
have a specimen in my collection taken near Hopedale, Labrador, a young
bird. Hantzsch found this plover breeding on Baffin Island.
Edwin Beaupre (1917) writes:
In September, 1906, a great flight of plover passed over
the city of Kingston, which is located on the extreme
eastern end of Lake Ontario. The flight was first noticed
about 8 o’clock in the evening, and to one familiar with
the soft, sweet piping of the golden plover, there was no
difficulty whatever in recognizing the bird. A record of
the flight showed that eight flocks passed over the city,
flying very low, at intervals of about 10 minutes. Toward
midnight it was impossible to enumerate the flocks, the
flight being continuous. This must have been the main
migration for that year, and it continued until 4 o’clock
in the morning, covering eight hours. Allowing a speed of
25 miles an hour--a conservative estimate--the distance
between the leading flocks and the rear guard must have
been approximately 200 miles. What a sublime spectacle
this would have been had one the privilege of seeing it in
the open light of day! The vanguard of this great aerial
aggregation must have reached almost to the Atlantic
seaboard, while the rear flocks were trailing their
wonderful way over the eastern waters of Lake Ontario. They
no doubt began their ocean journey some miles south of
the coast of Nova Scotia, but not far enough to seriously
affect their regular route to Argentina, in which country
they escape the hardship of a Canadian winter.
The above quotation and the fact that William Brewster (1925) recorded
the golden plover as visiting the Umbagog Lake region in Maine
“regularly and rather plentifully not so many years ago,” suggests the
idea that some of the birds we used to see in New England came by an
overland route. However, our big flights were probably birds that came
in from the sea under stress of bad weather, either before or during
easterly storms accompanied by heavy rains or thick fog. According to
Mr. Mackay’s (1891) records, covering a period of 32 years from 1858 to
1890, the last week in August seems to be the best time to look for a
flight, though he says “it is unusual to see any but scattering birds
before the 10th of September.” My earliest record for adult birds is
August 9; practically all the birds which come in August are adults.
The young birds come in September; my latest date is October 7. The
appearance of either adults or young on our coast has always been very
uncertain and irregular, dependent on the necessary weather conditions
coming at the proper time.
Mr. Mackay (1891) says:
While I have continually shot the young birds on Nantucket,
and in other parts of Massachusetts, their arrival is a
much more uncertain event than that of the older birds,
there being some years when I have seen none, and others
only a few. I have never known a year when they were
anything like as numerous as I have seen the older birds.
During some years large flocks of golden plover pass over the Bermudas
in September and October, according to Capt. Savile G. Reid (1884),
“but, unless in stormy weather, they do not alight in any great
numbers. Numbers appeared in September, 1874, frequenting the grassy
slopes of the north shore--their favorite haunt--and even the parade
grounds, during the continuance of a three day’s revolving gale.”
Col. H. W. Feilden (1889) writing of conditions in Barbados, the
easternmost of the West Indies, says:
Stragglers arrive as early as July and the beginning of
August, but the main flights come with the first heavy
weather after the 27th of August, and long experience and
observation proves that this date is kept year after year
with wonderful accuracy. The course of all the migratory
Charadriidae across Barbados in the autumn is from the
northwest to southeast, and if the wind blows from
southeast the birds are brought down to the island, for it
appears to be a tolerably well established observation that
birds prefer migrating with a “beam” wind. A shift of wind
from the northeast, with squally weather to the southeast,
is ardently longed for by the Barbados sportsmen toward the
end of August, as this forces the migratory hosts to alight
instead of passing over at a great height, as they are
seen to do when the wind is from the northeast. The first
arrivals of this species are invariably black-breasted
birds, showing that the old birds precede the young, and
the first comers are nearly all males. The young birds
without black on the breast appear about the 12th of
September, and continue to pass till the end of October,
sometimes stragglers are as late as November. Even in the
most favorable seasons, only a fraction of the immense
flights that pass over the island ever alight.
Much has been written about the Atlantic flight of the golden plover
and remarkably little has been said about the southward flight in the
interior, but such a flight occurs regularly, though in much smaller
numbers. Professor Rowan (1926) says that in Alberta:
We have notes of hundreds going south in a single day in
mid September, when the main movements occur annually.
An interesting feature of the fall migration of golden
plover is that it consists entirely of young birds. The
earliest record we have is August 18 and the next August
24. These are rather early, September being the chief
month of arrival. The fall movements are protracted, and
we may have small flocks with us till toward the end of
October. Another feature of the autumn migration is a
change of habit. The birds, while often noted on pasture
(particularly if in large flocks) more usually frequent the
muds and behave like the majority of other waders. They
associate freely and habitually with other species. They
behave like the strays of the spring. Being birds of the
year there is no doubt in their case that they are sexually
undeveloped.
We have a single record of an adult bird in the fall
collected by Harrold on August 22. It was noted the
previous day, but not secured, and proved to be a female
well advanced in its moult. There is one other reliable
autumn record for an adult golden plover from the Province,
seen at Sullivan Lake in July by Mr. T. E. Randall. Until
we have spent the whole of July at our lake or some other
suitable observation station, it will be impossible to say
that adults never--except accidentally as strays--come
south through the Province, but all evidence available
indicates that they do not do so.