Genus LXXIII. TRINGA. SANDPIPER. 

 Species I. T. BARTRAMTA* 



BARTRAM'S SANDPIPER. 



[Plate LIX. Fig. 2.] 



This bird being, as far as I can discover, a new species, undescribed 

 by any former author, I have honored it with the name of my very 

 worthy friend, near whose Botanic Gardens, on the banks of the river 

 Schuylkill, I first found it. On the same meadows I have since shot 

 several other individuals of the species, and have thereby had an oppor- 

 tunity of taking an accurate drawing, as well as description of it. 



Unlike most of their tribe, these birds appeared to prefer running 

 about among the grass, feeding on beetles, and other winged insects. 

 There were three or four in company ; they seemed extremely watchful, 

 silent, and shy, so that it was always with extreme difficulty I could 

 approach them. 



These birds are occasionally seen there during the months of August 

 and September, but whether they breed near, I have not been able to 

 discover. Having never met with them on the seashore, I am per- 

 suaded that their principal residence is in the interior, in meadows, and 

 such like places. They run with great rapidity, sometimes spreading 

 their tail, and dropping their wings, as birds do who wish to decoy you 

 from their nest ; when they alight, they remain fixed, stand very erect, 

 and have two or three sharp whistling notes as they mount to fly. 

 They are remarkably plump birds, weighing upwards of three-quarters 

 of a pound ; their flesh is superior, in point of delicacy, tenderness and 

 flavor, to any other of the tribe with which I am acquainted. 



This species is twelve inches long, and twenty-one in extent ; the bill 

 is an inch and a half long, slightly bent downwards, and wrinkled at the 

 base, the upper mandible black on its ridge, the lower, as well as the 

 edge of the upper, of a fine yellow ; front, stripe over the eye, neck and 

 breast, pale ferruginous, marked with small streaks of black, which, on 

 the lower part of the breast, assume the form of arrow heads ; crown 

 black, the plumage slightly skirted with whitish ; chin, orbit of the eye, 

 whole belly and vent, pure white ; hind-head, and neck above, ferrugi- 

 nous, minutely streaked with black ; back and scapulars black, the 



* Totanus Bartramiiis, Temm. Man. d' Orn. p. 650. 



(339) 



