Water Birds 383 



they are hatched. The loud call which gives the kill- 

 deer its name may be heard in the Northern states quite 

 early in the spring. Some of them winter north of the 

 Ohio River, others as far south as Peru. 



Killdeers are very useful birds. They eat crayfish, 

 mosquito larvae, horse flies, cattle ticks, crane flies, grass- 

 hoppers, crickets, cotton worms, cutworms, tomato 

 worms, alfalfa weevils, cotton-boll weevils, clover-root 

 weevils, clover-leaf weevils, rice weevils, cowpea cur- 

 culios, grapevine-leaf beetles, and insects that feed on 

 corn, sugar cane, apples, sweet potatoes, sugar beets, 

 carrots, and various other useful plants. They eat also 

 a kind of worm that preys on oysters. 



The killdeer is a kind of plover. Several other species 

 of plovers may be seen at the borders of pools or lakes or 

 on sand bars or mud flats, especially in the migrating 

 season. 



The spotted sandpiper. The sandpipers belong to 

 the same order but not to the same family as the plovers. 

 Both sandpipers and plovers are shore birds, but the 

 sandpipers have long, slender bills and are more like 

 snipes than they are like plovers. They probe into the 

 mud in search of food. They live along the seashore 

 and the shores of lakes and streams. 



Nearly a dozen kinds of sandpipers may be seen in the 

 course of a season on the shore of a single lake. The 

 only kind most persons know is the spotted sandpiper. 

 This is often seen along little streams as well as on the 

 shores of lakes and rivers. It is smaller than the kill- 

 deer and without conspicuous color marks. In fact, its 

 back harmonizes so well with the color of wet sand that 



