330 BULLETIN 142, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Field marks. — The greater yellow-legs resembles the lesser so 

 closely in color pattern that the two can not be readily distinguished 

 except by direct comparison in size. The bill of the greater is 

 relatively larger, and it is rather more boldly marked. The voices 

 of the two are somewhat different. Other characters are referred to 

 under the next species. 



Fall. — Adults move off their breeding grounds at an early date 

 and loiter along in a leisurely manner. The first migrants appear 

 in the northern states in July, sometimes as early as the second or 

 even the first week. Young birds come later; there is usually a 

 heavy flight of them during the first half of October, and many 

 linger in Massachusetts until the middle of November or later. Mr. 

 Brewster (1925) says of the migration at Umbagog Lake, Maine : 



We often saw them arriving and departing by day, usually in the early 

 morning or late afternoon if the weather were fine, at almost any time if it 

 were stormy. When seen approaching from farther north, they were commonly 

 first sighted so high in the air that they looked no bigger than swallows. 

 After circling twice or thrice over the lake on set wings, whistling loudly 

 and volubly, they were likely to pitch headlong into the marshes to feed 

 and rest there during the remainder of the clay, if not for a considerably 

 longer period, provided no gunner happened to fare that way. Some, how- 

 ever, kept straight on without stopping and perhaps without lowering their 

 line of flight below the level of the mountain tops to the southward over 

 which they were accustomed to pass." 



Mr. Whitaker tells me that the last of the yellow-shanks move out 

 of Newfoundland about the end of October; these are probably all 

 young birds. And Edward S. Thomas sends me a record for 

 Columbus, Ohio, of December 11, 1925. This bird well deserves the 

 name of " winter yellowlegs." 



Probably many migrate at sea, from Nova Scotia to the West 

 Indies, for Capt. Savile G. Reid (1884) says that it is " more or less 

 common " in Bermuda, " arriving early in August and remaining for 

 a month or so," where it is " much in request among the energetic 

 sportsmen." 



Game. — The greater yellow-legs is a fine game bird; I can not say 

 as much for the lesser yellow-legs. Large numbers have been shot in 

 past years. Prof. Wells W. Cooke (1912) says: "A hunter near 

 Newport, Rhode Island, shot 1,362 greater yellow-legs in the eight 

 seasons, 1867-1874; his highest score, 419 birds, was in 1873, from 

 August 19 to October 19." Dr. Charles W. Townsend (1905) reports 

 that "463 greater yellow-legs were sent from Newburyport and 

 vicinity on one day, October 11, 1904, to a single stall in Boston 

 market." I knew an old gunner who celebrated his eightieth birth- 

 day a few years ago by shooting 40 yellow-legs. 



It is a pity that the delightful sport of bay-bird shooting, which 

 was such a pleasant feature of our earlier shooting days, had to be 



