58 



JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



stretched and ruffled necks and re- 

 main in this comical position with 

 their bills almost touching for several 

 seconds, pei-haps the outcome of a 

 dispute over the possession of a par- 

 ticularly fat sand flea. 



It is ti'ue that the Turnstone will 

 quickly turn over a shell or pebble 

 with his oddly shaped bill in his 

 search for food, this habit being 

 characteristic and generally known 

 to students of ornitliology, but his 

 unique peculiarity of rooting, if I 

 may so term it, is something I have 

 never seen him given credit for by 

 any observer of bird life. I use the 

 word rooting advisedly for his pro- 

 cedure is nothing else (unless you 

 were to call it shoveling) and resem- 

 bles the modus operandi of the pig when 

 searching for food beneath the sur- 

 face. 



During the past fall a portion of the 

 cove where ray shooting blind was 

 erected was filled with a bank of sea- 

 weed washed in by a severe No 'East- 

 er. This wall was over two feet high 

 and though mostly composed of rock- 

 weed and Irish moss was intermixed 

 with sand fragments of shell and de- 

 bris from the sea bottom and was 

 fairly alive with sand fleas and prob- 

 ably other insects. As it gradually 

 dried it made a fine feeding ground 

 for tlae shore birds who resorted to it 

 daily in large numbers. 



Now with one exception every 

 species observed by me gleaned its 

 food from this primative yet bounti- 

 ful table in an orderly, respectful and 

 dignified, yes I might say dainty man- 

 ner without displacing a piece of 

 shell or sprig of moss or weed. Most 

 of their food would be taken from the 

 surface with an occasional delicate 

 probing. The exception was the 

 Turnstone. 



He would select a likely spot on the 

 loosely packed moss and go at his work 

 with a vim and rapidity entirely dif- 

 ferent from the other species. Un- 

 derneath the bits of weed moss and 

 fragments of shell his sharp upturned 

 bill would swiftly go and a perfect 

 shower of these would soon be falling 

 in front and beside him. Finding a 

 morsel to his taste he would devour it 

 in much less time than it takes to re- 

 late it and the rooting and tossing of 

 the bits into the air would continue. 

 At times quite sizeable fragments of 

 shell and pieces of moss more than an 



inch in length would be thrown fully 

 seven or eight inches above the birds 

 head, and this he would keep up with 

 scare ly an instants pause for a quarter 

 of an hour and until he had excavated 

 a pit large enough to almost conceal 

 his plump mottled body. Occasion- 

 ally he would turn about in his tracks 

 but as a rule he worked in one direc- 

 tion. 



My champion digger as 1 termed 

 him on tliis particular occasion now 

 became alarmed at the sudden ap- 

 proach of a Pigeon Hawk ( FaUo loluni- 

 liarius) which swept swiftly down 

 among the large flock of shore birds, 

 sending them scurrying off in every 

 direction to places of safety, but with 

 the passing of his hawkship they were 

 quickly back again and my Turnstone 

 or one like him alighted this time 

 close to my blind so near in fact that 

 glasses were of no assistance in ob- 

 serving him. The exact distance I 

 afterwards ascertained was just nine 

 feet from where I sat and he gave me 

 from this vantage point another ex- 

 hibition of what he could do in the 

 way of excavating. 



He stood still for a moment and 

 then walking a few steps commenced 

 as before, and everything small 

 enough for him to move that stood 

 between him and his dinner was sent 

 flying into the air. 



It occurred to me to time the chap 

 this time in his feat of tunneling. He 

 acarely paused in his work for ten 

 minutes and in that short time he had 

 dug a trench long enough and deep 

 enough to completely hide his body, 

 his head only being visible and this 

 scarcely in sight at times, a feat I 

 could hardly credit my own eyes with 

 seeing. 



On he dug, the minutes passing until 

 watching him at his work became a 

 trifle monotonous and to vary the 

 thing I tossed a pebble over near him. 

 He raised his pretty mottled head 

 paused a moment and went at his 

 rooting as before. 



Again I dropped a bit of shell near 

 him and he again paused and scanned 

 the surroundings but a good digestion 

 waited on appetite in his case evi- 

 dently and again search for food was 

 continued. At last I sent a large 

 muscle shell his way and that proved 

 more than he could stand in the way 

 of bombardment for stepping out of 

 his trench and catching sight of me 



