THE



127



Avicultural Magazine,


BEING THE JOURNAL OF

THE AVICULTURAL SOCIETY.



Third Series .— Vol. VII.—No. 5. —All rights reserved,. MARCH. 1916.



NOTES ON WADERS SEEN IN THE

ISLES OF SCILLY.


By E. Innis Dorrien-Smith.


These islands are a perfect place for waders of all kinds, with

their flat shelving beaches and stretches of sand at low water round

the coast, fresh water pools and marshy ground in places inland and

rocks and seaweed for oystercatchers, turnstones, ring plovers and

purple sandpipers.


The purple sandpiper is probably the least well known of the

more common waders, and inhabits the outer rocks where the ocean

seas break in. They race up and down, dodging the waves and

spray, just lightly using their wings when their feet will not carry

them fast enough. Seldom more than one or two are seen at a time,

but they have their special haunts where they are nearly always to

be found and invariably in the wildest places. Their breeding-place

is far away in the north, but a few usually remain here all the

summer. Turnstones are by no means so exclusive in their haunts,

and, besides braving the breaking seas on the outer rocks with the

purple sandpiper, they abound on the shores and sandy beaches of the

islands. At all times of the year they are to be seen, and in June in

full breeding plumage, though generally they are very scarce from

mid-June till towards the end of July when they return with their

young ones. I was asked a short time ago if it were possible to

catch turnstones in these islands and if there were many here. To

catch them I fear is a very difficult task, as the ebb and flow of



