OF NEW ENGLAND. 405 



of the same clay we found six or eight birds in a bit of wood 

 where we had never seen Woodcock before, and no doubt the 

 morning's bird was among them. 



It is quite evident that Woodcock do not fly in flocks, like 

 plover or wild fowl, compactly and under the direction of a 

 leader, but that each travels independently, coming in contact 

 with his companions through their common tastes. Yet it is 

 said to be wise to leave a bird or two in every cover as " tollers." 

 Twice when the writer has met a flight, both occasions being 

 late in the afternoon, he has gone through the cover once, 

 thought it shot out, returned over the same ground as it was 

 growing dark, found half as many more, and still, as he has 

 stood after dark on the edge of the cover and has walked 

 away, he has perceived the birds dropping in one by one. The 

 next day scarcely a bird could be found there. 



The Woodcock prett}^ generally disappear (near Boston) by 

 the twenty-fifth of October, though it is not uncommon to have 

 good shooting a fortnight later. It seems that the old birds 

 sometimes precede the young in their flights, as is the case 

 with the Sea Coot and Golden Plover. The writer once 

 weighed eighteen, shot on the second of October, whose aver- 

 age weight was seven ounces. This may have been owing to 

 some extraordinary combination of accidents ; but every 

 sportsman is familiar with those very small, wiry, compactly 

 feathered, weather-tanned birds, who appear in October, and 

 who are called, perhaps locally, " Labrador twisters." 



The influence of weather upon the birds is an interesting but 

 puzzling study. A heavy rain or frost causes them to shift 

 their quarters from swamps to hillsides or vice versa; a drought 

 or heavy flood drives them away altogether. In autumn, just 

 before a northeast storm, birds that have been on a ground the 

 whole season sometimes seem very nervous and restless, jump- 

 ing up wildly and flying far ; in the same cover, after the storm, 

 no birds can be found. 



The flight of the Woodcock, when first flushed, is short and 

 very slow. In summer, the same bird may often be shot at 

 eight or ten times, by persistent and thorough searching. He 



