SCOLOPACIDvE 



591 





THE COMMON SANDPIPER. 



TcjTANUS HYPOLEUCUS (LinnKus). 



This species, often called the Summer-Snipe, is a regular visitor 

 to the British Islands, usually appearing in April and leaving again 

 by the end of September, though a few birds occasionally remain 

 till November. Inasmuch as its favourite haunts are the gravelly 

 margins of lakes or of running water, and islets of shingle with 

 scanty herbage in trout-streams, this Sandpiper is chiefly seen on 

 migration in the south-east of England ; but it breeds, sparingly, 

 along the moorland brooks of Cornwall, Devon and Somerset, and 

 perhaps in Dorset, Sussex, Kent and Buckinghamshire. In Wales, 

 and in fact west of the Severn and north of the Trent, it is well 

 known ; while in Scotland it is to be found on almost every loch 

 and burn throughout the mainland, ranging to the Outer Hebrides, 

 Orkneys and Shetlands. It is generally distributed in Ireland. 



In summer this Sandpiper is plentiful from the Arctic circle 

 down to the Pyrenees, Alps, Carpathians, and mountains of Greece 

 and Turkey, while a small number breed in Spain, the Canaries, 

 Madeira, and the Mediterranean basin. In the last, however, 

 the species is better known in winter, at which season it ascends 

 the Nile valley to Abyssinia, and can be traced along the entire 

 coast-line of Africa, as well as to Madagascar &c. In Asia it is 

 found from the Arctic circle southwards, crossing the great mountain 



