BIRDS OF CUBA 63 



96. Himantopus mexicanus (Miiller). 

 Black-necked Stilt; Zancudo. 



I saw my first Stilts in Cuba from the top of the great lighthouse 

 at Cabo Cruz in the spring of 1914. This lookout gave over a varied scene 

 and one worth a moment's digression to describe. The peninsula of Cape 

 Cruz itself is low and rocky, dry, arid and covered with cacti, thorny 

 acacias and the like. Inside the hook to the north are marl flats and patches 

 of mangroves, enclosing shallow salt-ponds which broil and glisten and 

 dance in the burning sun. Up the coast toward Belig and Niquero extended 

 the lowland forest, rich with mahogany, sabicu and many other precious 

 woods. This forest caught wet winds, which the Cape did not, and had 

 already attracted foreign capital, assuring its early reduction and ultimate 

 destruction. Eastward from the Cape rose the great ridge of the Sierra 

 Maestra, El Monje, Ojo de Toro, and far in the blue distance Turquino 

 itself. Our midnight arrival at the Cape in a tiny shallop — I was with de la 

 Torre — had resulted in the clanging of heavy doors as the 'watch' suddenly 

 awakened and felt that bandits, always to be thought of, had this time 

 really materialized. We had kicked our way through the cacti in the bright 

 moonlight, and, tired and very sweaty, we hoped for a place to sleep. 

 It was no small task to convince the sturdy Spaniards that sleep, not 

 robbery, was our one interest. We soon became friends; the light-keepers 

 of Cuba, all Spaniards, are a fine, sturdy crew and hospitable to a fault. 

 We soon came to use the light as a lookout, and down in the salt-ponds we 

 saw the Stilts every day. A small resident band, of perhaps twenty 

 individuals, fed regularly through the hottest hours in a pond so deep that 

 the water reached nearly to their bellies. The flight, with neck and long 

 legs extended, is unlike that of any shore bird and reminds one more of 

 the Jagana's. I saw Stilts also occasionally about fresh waters and collected 

 one at Aguada de Pasajeros on February 4, 1913. I always have found them 

 very shy and hard to approach. Gundlach found the nest and eggs in 

 May and has described them. 



97. Capella gallinago delicata (Ord). 

 Wilson's Snipe; Becasi'n. 



A regular winter visitor, and one which may be really abundant if the 

 rains have been long and hard so that extensive wet pastures and low, moist 



