42 



THE OQLOGIST 



Red-Backed Sandpiper. 



Tringa Alpina Pacifica, 

 also called Blackbellied Sandpiper or 

 Oxbird, when in Fall plumage they go 

 as Leadbacks, Blackbreast or Red- 

 back. To my knowledge this Sand- 

 piper was never taken here. 



A friend of mine, Mr. Rappich of 

 2293 Main street, was gunning this 

 Fall, November 2d at Longpoint on the 

 shores of Lake Erie on a marshy wet 

 spot covered with herbage so famil- 

 iar to the old time hunters like 

 Charles Gerber, Steve Roberts, Ed. 

 F'ish, Arthur A. Bissel and others, and 

 was fortunate enough to bag a great 

 many Wilson or locally called Eng- 

 lish Snipe, several large Yellow-legs 

 and last but not least a smaller Sand- 

 piper that had the habit of bunching 

 together. 



After one discharge of his gun, he 

 found six of them in the long marshy 

 grass. As he had never seen any Sand- 

 pipers like these before, he concluded 

 to take them home and present them 

 to me for further investigation. 



Several hundred feet from the shore 

 is a bar where he saw a great many 

 Wild Geese, presumably the Canada 

 Goose, but it was impossible to get 

 near enough to shoot some, as they 

 were exceedingly shy and wary. 



After coming home, Mr. Rappich 

 was kind enough to send me the six 

 Sandpiper. As coarse shot were used, 

 I was fortunate in mounting two of 

 them and used one skin for identifi- 

 cation, which proved beyond any 

 doubt that it is the Red-backed Sand- 

 piper, which breeds within the Arctic 

 Circle, and to my best information 

 there are none of their eggs in any of 

 our collections. 



There is of course every degree of 

 intergration between summer and win- 

 ter plumage, but this species may al- 

 ways be known by its slightly curved 

 bill. It flies and feeds in flocks and 



is an unsuspicious rather stupid little 

 Snipe. Less active than most of this 

 family. 



The accompanying picture was 

 taken from the Work of John James 

 Audubon, (1780-1851) the great Amer- 

 ican Ornithologist, made almost 100 

 years ago, now in possession of the 

 Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences 

 through the kindness of Dr. Roswell 

 Park. Ottamar Reinecke. 



Possible Nesting of Bachman's Spar- 

 row (Peuaea aestivalis bachmani.) 

 in Southern Pennsylvania. 

 S. S. Dickey. 

 A few years ago my friend, Mr. 

 James Carter, discovered near Way- 

 nesburg, what I believe to have been 

 the nest and egg of Peucaea aestiva- 

 lis bachmani. Mr. Carter, who is an 

 enthusiastic ornithologist, was walk- 

 ing through a field of grass and weeds 

 that bordered on an oak wood, when 

 he caught sight of a strange nest rest- 

 ing in a grass clump. Upon close ex- 

 amination he found that the nest was 

 an arched affair of grassblades and 

 stems, and that it held a single white, 

 glossy, unmarked egg. Careful watch- 

 ing nearby failed to reveal the owner 

 of the nest. At the end of a few days 

 Mr. Carter returned to the field and 

 found that the nest had been desert- 

 ed as only the single damp egg rested 

 within. It has been my great pleasure 

 to examine carefully this single spe- 

 cimen (measuring .74 x .53 inches). It 

 will be seen that the measurements 

 closely resemble those commonly re- 

 corded for eggs of this sparrow. To 

 my knowledge this species has never 

 been recorded as a summer resident 

 of Pennsylvania, with the single ex- 

 ception of my record of the past sum- 

 mer. At that time I found several 

 pairs of the birds inhabiting the wild- 

 er country some ten miles south of 

 Waynesburg and but a few miles from 

 the West Virginia border line. 



