136 BIRDS OF GUERNSEY. 



piper, being black narrowly barred with white; and 

 in the Wood Sandpiper the reverse, white with a few 

 dark bars and markings ; the tail also, in the 

 Green Sandpiper, is much more distinctly and 

 boldy barred with black and white. Alive and on 

 the wing they may be immediately distinguished 

 by the pure white rump and tail-coverts of the 

 Green Sandpiper, which are very conspicuous, 

 especially as the bird rises ; the white on the same 

 parts of the Wood Sandpiper is much marked with 

 brown, and consequently never appears so con- 

 spicuously. There is one Green Sandpiper at 

 present in the Museum, which there seems no 

 reason to doubt is Guernsey killed. 



114. Common Sandpiper. Totanus luipolcuros, 

 Linnaeus. French, "Chevalier guignette." — The 

 Common Sandpiper, or Summer Snipe as it is 

 sometimes called, is a spring and autumn visitant, 

 but never a numerous one, sometimes, however, 

 remaining till the summer. One of Mr. De Putron's 

 men told me he had seen one or two about their 

 pond all this summer (1878), and he believed they 

 bred there ; but as to this I am very sceptical ; I 

 could see nothing of the bird when I visited the pond 

 in June and July, and I fancy the birds stayed about, 

 as they do sometimes about my own pond here in 

 Somerset, till late perhaps in May, and then departed 

 to breed elsewhere. The latest occurrence I know 



