BUFF-BREASTED SANDPIPER 205 
BUFF-BREASTED SANDPIPER 
Tryngites rufescens 
Above dark brownish black, each feather widely edged with buff ; 
wings blackish, narrowly tipped with white, the inner half of the inner 
web whitish reticulated with black ; tail blackish, the outer rectrices 
lighter, each with subterminal black crescent and white terminal 
edge; beneath buff, darker on the throat and breast, and edged with 
whitish, lighter on flanks and belly ; under primary-coverts barred 
and reticulated with black, like the inner web of the primaries, 
and forming a marked contrast with the rest of the under surface of 
the wing, which is pure white ; length 7.7, wing 5.3 inches. Female 
similar. 
Tus species is also an annual visitor to the pampas 
from the Arctic regions where it breeds. It begins 
to arrive, usually in small bodies, early in the month 
of October ; and during the summer is seldom met 
with in flocks of any size on the pampas, but is usually 
seen on the dry, open ground associating in small 
numbers with the Golden Plover, the Whimbrel, 
and other northern species. I however think it 
probable that it travels farther south than its fellow- 
migrants from North America, and has its principal 
feeding-grounds somewhere in the interior of Pata- 
gonia; also that its northern journey takes place 
later than that of other species. In some seasons I 
have observed these birds in April and May, in 
flocks of two to five hundred, travelling north, flock 
succeeding flock at intervals of about fifteen minutes, 
and continuing to pass for several days. 
