336 GAME BIRDS, WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



History. 



This cosmopolitan species is a large bird, of fine, imi)osing 

 and almost distinguished appearance in its black and white 

 nuptial dress. The shape of its head and beak seems to indi- 

 cate force of character, and its large, dark, beautiful eyes are 

 full of intelligence. Its wild, plaintive call is one of the sweetest 

 notes heard on our storm-beaten coast. 



The plumage of the adult is so different from that of the 

 young that it is not to be wondered at that gunners often 

 regard the Beetle-head as another species than the Black- 

 breast; but the former is the young of the latter. 



Nelson (1877) believed that the birds which remained 

 in Illinois during the summer bred there ^ but of this there 

 is no direct evidence. This is one of the species which, 

 according to Audubon, once passed the summer here, and 

 bred in New England and as far south as Pennsylvania, 

 but it is believed that he was mistaken in this, as the eggs 

 he describes resemble those of the Upland Plover. Nuttall 

 (1834) says that the Black-breast rears but one brood in 

 Massachusetts, where it rarely breeds; but the bird does 

 not breed here now, and probably never did, although 

 formerly it was seen here all summer, and a few have been 

 reported within recent years. Howe and Allen give dates of 

 June 18 and July 8. Dr. C. W. Townsend found a pair on 

 Ipswich Beach on June 25, 1903. This bird still possibly sum- 

 mers as far south as Florida, where Scott and Worthington 

 reported it on June 14, July 4 and July 26, and it summers 

 in South Carolina, where it is a permanent resident. ^ A few 

 remain there all summer, but do not breed (Wayne). The 

 June birds seen there are in winter or immature plumage. 



The American breeding grounds of this species are little 

 known, but it is believed to breed mainly on the coast and 

 islands of the Arctic Ocean, from Hudson Bay to Alaska and on 

 the Barren Grounds. It migrates apparently over practically 

 the same route in both spring and fall, and is found in migration 



1 Nelson, E. W.: Bull. Essex Inst., 1876, Vol. 8, p. 122. 



2 Wayne, Arthur T.: Birds of South Carolina, 1910, p. 58. 



