Genus XCII. KHYNCHOPS. SKIMMER. 

 Species. RHYNCHOPS NIGRA. 



BLACK SKIMMER, or SHEARWATER. 



[Plate LX. Fig. 4.] 

 Arci. Zool. No. 445. — Catesby, i., 90. — Le Bee en Ciseaux, Boff. viii., 454, tab. 36.* 



This truly singular fowl is the only species of its tribe hitherto dis- 

 covered. Like many others, it is a bird of passage in the United States ; 

 and makes its first appearance, on the shores of New Jersey, early in 

 May. It resides there, as well as along the whole Atlantic coast, during 

 the summer ; and retires early in September. Its favorite haunts are 

 low sand-bars, raised above the reach of the summer tides ; and also dry 

 flat sands on the beach, in front of the ocean. On such places it usually 

 breeds along the shores of Cape May, in New Jersey. On account of 

 the general coldness of the spring there, the Shearwater does not begin 

 to lay until early in June, at which time these birds form themselves 

 into small societies, fifteen or twenty pair frequently breeding within a 

 few yards of each other. The nest is a mere hollow, formed in the 

 sand, without any materials. The female lays three eggs, almost exactly 

 oval, of a clear white, marked with large round spots of brownish black, 

 and intermi.xed with others of pale Indian ink. These eggs measure 

 one inch and three-quarters, by one inch and a quarter. Half a bushel 

 and more of eggs has sometimes been collected from one sand bar, within 

 the compass of half an acre. These eggs have something of a fi.shy 

 taste ; but are eaten by many people on the coast. The female sits on 

 them only during the night, or in wet and stormy weather. The young 

 remain for several weeks before they are able to fly ; are fed with great 

 assiduity by both parents ; and seem to delight in lying with loosened 

 wings, flat on the sand, enjoying its invigorating warmth. They breed 

 but once in the season. 



The singular conformation of the bill of this bird has excited much 

 surprise ; and some writers, measuring the divine proportions of nature 

 by their own contracted standards of conception, in the plenitude of 

 their vanity have pronounced it to be "an awkward and defective 



* PI. Enl. 357. 

 Vol. III.— 3 (33) 



