198 BULLETIN" 142, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



the kreep call they utter in flight is sufficiently unlike that of any other wader 

 of similar size and general coloring to be of service as a means of field iden- 

 tification when the birds are seen on wing. It is appreciably different from 

 the call of any other sandpiper known to me, although not so very unlike 

 that of the sanderling. 



Field marks. — The Baird sandpiper is one of the most difficult of 

 all this group to recognize in the field, because it has no prominent 

 distinguishing field marks peculiar to itself. It has characters in 

 common with any one of several small sandpipers. In color and 

 general appearance it is most like the least sandpiper ; it is decidedly 

 larger, but size is of little value unless the two are side by side for 

 comparison ; it is lighter colored above, more extensively buffy on the 

 breast, and has darker legs. It is a size larger than the semipalmated 

 and western sandpipers, more buffy on the breast than either, and 

 has a shorter bill in proportion to its size than the latter. It is 

 about the size of the white-rumped sandpiper, but is less distinctly 

 streaked on the crown and back; the buff breast of the Baird will 

 distinguish it when standing or even in flight ; and the white rump of 

 fuscicollis is a sure flight mark when visible. From the red-backed 

 sandpiper, about the same size, it can be distinguished by its shorter 

 and straighter bill and by marked color differences. It might be 

 mistaken for a female pectoral, but the latter is more conspicuously 

 striped above, more like a snipe in this respect, the crown is darker, 

 more contrasted, and the breast is darker, more abruptly separated 

 from the white belly, and more sharply streaked with dusky; when 

 flying the pectoral shows more white in the wings. The Baird is 

 but slightly smaller than the buff-breasted sandpiper and very much 

 like it; but Prof. William Rowan (MSS.) has pointed out some 

 differences. The patterns of the backs are very similar, but the 

 buff breasted has a much paler crown and lacks the white throat and 

 eye stripe, as well as the clear-cut white sides and black center of 

 the rump of the Baird. The buff breasted has yellow legs and the 

 Baird has black. The Baird shows no white in the wings in flight. 

 Young Bairds in juvenal plumage are easily recognized by the scaled 

 appearance of the mantle produced by dark feathers with broad 

 white edges. 



Fall. — Baird sandpipers leave their northern breeding grounds 

 rather early. Mr. Murdoch (1885) reported the last one seen at 

 Point Barrow on August 12, and Mr. Dixon (1917) saw none after 

 August 15 in northern Alaska. E. A. Preble (1908) saw several 

 flocks on migration at Great Slave Lake as early as July 10. 



The main flight seems to be directly south through the Mackenzie 

 Valley and between the Rocky Mountains and the Mississippi River 

 to Mexico and South America, where it probably migrates down the 

 west coast to its winter home. But the route is also extended both 

 east and west in the fall. Some birds fly southeastward, through 



