286 BULLETIN 14 6, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



rufous feathers and both old and new blackish brown feathers. The 

 sexes are recognizable in this plumage, the males being much 

 brighter. A complete molt in August produces the adult winter 

 plumage. 



Adults have a complete postnuptial molt, from July to October, 

 but mainly in August, when the wings are molted. They have a 

 partial prenuptial molt from February to June, mainly in March 

 and April, involving the body plumage, but not all the scapulars 

 or wing coverts. 



Food. — The turnstone is mainly a maritime species and its favorite 

 feeding grounds are the stony and sandy beaches along the seashore 

 and the rocky promontories and islets on the coasts. But on its 

 inland migrations it finds its food on the shores and beaches of the 

 larger lakes and rivers. The turnstone derives its name from its 

 well-known and conspicuous habit of turning over, with its short, 

 stout bill and sturdy muscles, stones, shells, clods of earth, seaweed, 

 and other objects in search for the dainty morsels of animal food 

 that it finds beneath them. If the object is not too large the bird 

 stoops down and overturns it with a quick jerk of the head and neck ; 

 but against a larger obstacle it places its breast and pushes with all 

 its strength ; it is surprising to see how large a stone or clod it can 

 move. It also has a peculiar habit of rooting like a pig in piles of 

 seaweed or in the open sand. Windrows of seaweed and other rubbish 

 are generally full of sand fleas and various worms and insects and 

 their larvae, where the turnstones and other waders find an abundant 

 feast. Frank T. Noble (1904) has described this very well, as 

 follows : 



He would select a likely spot on the loosely packed inoss and go at his work 

 with a vim and rapidity entirely different from the other species. Underneath 

 the bits of weed, moss, and fragments of shell his sharp upturned bill would 

 swiftly go and a perfect shower of these would soon be falling in front and 

 beside him. Finding a morsel to his taste he wou'd devour it in much less time 

 than it takes to relate it, and the rooting and tossing of the bits into the air 

 would continue. At times quite sizeable fragments of shell and pieces of moss 

 more than an inch in length would be thrown fully 7 or 8 inches above the bird's 

 head, and this he "would keep up, with scarcely an instant's pause, for a quarter 

 of an hour and until he had excavated a pit large enough to almost conceal his 

 plump, mottled body. Occasionally he would turn about in his tracks, but as a 

 rule he worked in one direction. 



I have seen a similar method employed on a sand flat laid bare at 

 low tide, where four or five turnstones were feeding, accompanied by 

 sanderlings and peeps. The turnstones were digging holes in the 

 wet sand, throwing out the sand for a distance of several inches, 

 until the holes were big enough to admit the whole of a man's fist 

 and deep enough to conceal the bird's head and neck. Meantime the 



