NO. 32 BIRDS OF ALEUTIAN ISLANDS — BENT I5 



fully colored downy young-, not yet old enough to run. Mr. Wet- 

 more also found a brood of downy young- on Adak Island on June 27. 

 We found these sandpipers always very tame and unsuspicious and, 

 except on their breeding grounds, remarkably silent and inactive. 

 They move about very little while feeding and pay no attention to 

 passers-by even at short distances ; it was often necessary to ])ack off 

 before shooting one. 



On their breeding grounds, on the high dry tundra or mossy hill- 

 sides, they were much more active and noisy, indulging in their 

 hovering flight songs thirty or forty feet up in the air, a series of 

 delightful twittering notes as they fluttered downward, or giving 

 their loud musical flute-like whistling notes, suggestive of the melo- 

 dious calls of the Upland Plover, while flying about or standing on 

 the top of some prominent hummock. 



Among a series of eleven birds collected on Attu Island on June 

 23 are two birds which closely resemble ptilocncmis in color, but in 

 size are typical of coiiesi. At least one of them was a breeding bird, 

 the parent of a brood of downy young, and doubtless both of them 

 were summer resident birds. At this point so far west of their 

 normal range and entirely outside of their known migration route, 

 they could hardly be regarded as straggling or belated migrants, 

 which might be expected in the eastern Aleutian Islands. They can, 

 therefore, be regarded only as aberrant specimens of coiiesi or vari- 

 ants towards ptilocnemis. In our series of conesi from the Aleutian 

 Islands are a number of other specimens which are somewhat inter- 

 mediate between the two forms but are undoubtedly referable to 



couesi. 



LIMOSA LAPPONICA BAUERI 



Pacific Godwit 

 \\'hile walking around the shores of a pond on Atka Island on 

 June 13, I flushed two Godwits which I am quite sure were of this 

 species, although I was unable to secure them. They were probably 

 late migrants. 



HAEMATOPUS BACHMANI 

 Black Oyster-catcher 

 Oyster-catchers were fairly common about Kiska Harbor where 

 we saw them sitting on the rocks or flying about and uttering their 

 loud and penetrating cries. They were remarkably inconspicuous 

 on the rocks and not at all shy. At Adak Island we saw a flock of 

 eight or ten birds several times flying about the harbor or standing 

 on a rockv islet. They may have been breeding at one of these 



