Massachusetts Audubon Society 5 



THE TRAGEDY OF THE DOVEKIE 

 By Arthur J. Parker 



That quaint and engaging bird, the dovekie, is uncommonly numerous 

 this month (January) off the Massachusetts coast. There has just been 

 brought to me, for the second time, one of these little auks to identify. This 

 last one was picked up in Kendal Green, after the hard northeast storm of 

 January 11th. The finder was puzzled and curious on two points. First, 

 what brought this sea-bird so far inland? Second, why did it there perish, 

 instead of flying back to its ocean home? (The mystery was deepened by 

 the fact that these two birds were full-fed and in prime condition.) 



The first question was, of course, readily answered. Given the twofold 

 agency of a high onshore gale and the thick obscurity of clouds and rain 

 (or snow), it is inevitable that the buffeted and bewildered dovekie is often 

 carried helpless inland, and stranded there. This combination of adverse 

 conditions makes a victim oftenest of this particular species, partly, it would 

 seem, because of its feeding-habits. Its favorite food, marine insects or 

 "sea-lice," and Crustacea, is supplied most generously by the violent action 

 of storms. The pounding waves stir the inshore shallows and bring this 

 food from the bottom and to the surface. The dovekie, we may suppose, 

 feeds to repletion, then, weary of ducking imder angry billows, essays to 

 leave for other parts — supposedly marine. So, starting its "getaway" from 

 under or the midst of a swell, it flies upward, darts like a rocket from the 

 wave and launches on the gale. Then it is that our luckless bird is caught 

 amidst the blinding murk in the mighty air-tide, and, lacking "sea-room," is 

 promptly borne over the land. And there, sooner or later, decoyed, perhaps, 

 by glimpses of wet or icy surfaces below, it descends — to its doom. 



But why its doom? Why (was asked) could not so strong a flier 

 return to its ocean home on the cessation of the storm? . . . Because it 

 cannot rise. This bird, superbly at home on the sea, is doubly lost on land. 

 The level, smooth fields, or snow and ice, hold it as in a trap. Its small^ 

 backward-placed legs give it no sufficient spring to lift it from the ground; 

 while, to complete its undoing, its narrow wings prove unfitted to take quick 

 hold on the air and are so long as to strike the ground in futile, exhausting 

 thrashings. Like a chimney swift on a floor, or an albatross on a ship's deck, 

 the bird cannot rise. Especially, the bird cannot regain the air when calm. 

 It is said that a grebe, a loon, or an auk may sometimes rise from level 

 ground, by launching headlong i?Uo a wind, wings outspread, to be picked 

 up, as it were, bodily. But slippery ice or snow may defeat even this slender 

 chance — the feet then get no purchase or power for a take-off. . . . Out 

 of its element, indeed; dying (one might fancy) with longings after the 

 friendly bosom of the familiar, unfrozen sea. 



How the great, impersonal forces of Nature combine at times against the 

 birds! Something of an ironical fate would seem to have operated against 

 those dovekies that were brought to me. The storm that carried them 

 inland to destruction had first supplied them, perhaps lured them, with a 

 feast. That feast possibly held them too near the fatal land, or too long. 

 That feast provided the last straw of over-weight whereby release from the 

 Uuid into the free air became decisively impossible. 



One dovekie I have just heard of (from Cape Cod) for which was 

 reserved a happier fate. It was picked up by a boy; I think he may have 

 been a Boy Scout. The boy held up the forlorn, homesick sea-dove on his 

 hand. And thence, as from its natal eyrie or its accustomed rocky roost, 

 the grateful bird launched away, and sought the ocean. 



