BIRDS HUNTED FOR FOOD OR SPORT. 339 



on berries and grasshoppers, like the Golden Plover. Formerly 

 it fed more on the hill pastures along these shores and the 

 islands near them, but continual shooting in spring and fall 

 drove it from some of these feeding grounds, to which it never 

 has returned. 



Favorite resorts of these birds on Cape Cod during the days 

 of their greatest plenty were the flats and marshes of the harbor 

 of Barnstable, along Sandy Neck, the Dennis marshes, the 

 flats near Chatham, and marshes near Hyannis and Well- 

 fleet. Nantucket, Tuckernuck and Martha's Vineyard also 

 were favorite feeding grounds. The earliest date I find given 

 for this Plover in spring in Massachusetts is April 18 (Mackay), 

 but they do not usually come in numbers much before the 

 15th of May. Their numbers commonly decrease about 

 June 1, and by June 5 to June 8 they practically have dis- 

 appeared, as few ever remain for the summer. 



A careful review of all the available records of the flight 

 of this species in the different States of the Union leads to the 

 following conclusions: (1) The records show conclusively that 

 the species has decreased very much over the continent during 

 the last seventy-five years, except, perhaps, on the Pacific 

 coast, where there are few early records. (2) It never collected 

 in such large flights as did the Golden Plover. (3) It now 

 appears to be more numerous on the Atlantic coast, particularly 

 on Cape Cod, than in the interior. 



In the west the Blackbreast is partial to ploughed fields, 

 where it feeds on earthworms, grubs, cutworms and beetles. 

 Prof. Samuel Aughey had two of these birds sent him from 

 Sarpy County, Neb., and found their stomachs crammed with 

 the destructive Rocky mountain locust and very few other 

 insects. Mackay in his excellent paper on this bird says that 

 in the Massachusetts marshes it feeds on the larvae of a cutworm, 

 and that it eats the large, whitish, maritime grasshopper 

 (CEdipoda maritima) , also marine insects and very small shell- 

 fish, which constitute a very large part of their food during 

 their flight along the coast of Massachusetts.^ 



1 Mackay, George H.: Auk, 1892, p. 146. 



