TRACKS AND TRACKING 



scribed. All of these, but particularly the last 

 named, have long hind toes and claws. 



It is very seldom that one finds the tracks 

 of flickers, but they are easily distinguished 

 by the two toes in front, the two behind and 

 the hopping gait. 



Although gulls often alight and leave their 

 tracks in the dunes, the footprints of sea 

 birds are best studied on the damp beach, and 

 a chapter might be written on this subject 

 alone. The most characteristic of these tracks 

 are those of the shore birds, and one can 

 easily distinguish the records of plover from 

 the records of sandpipers, both by the foot- 

 prints and by the bill-marks. Flocks of plover 

 spread out irregularly on the sand, and leave 

 tracks running in various directions and con- 

 stantly crossing, while the sandpipers have 

 more team play, and run along the beach, up 

 and down before the advancing and retreat- 

 ing waves, but always together. The sand- 

 piper, with head down nearly all the time, 

 drills the sand with his long bill, and leaves 

 behind him an almost uninterrupted series of 

 holes close together for the space of a foot 

 or more, then a blank space where only his 

 footprints show as he hurries along, swallow- 



63 



