BAY SHOOTIJNU. 113 



BAY SHOOTING. 



Y this term I intend to designate 

 the shooting of all those species 

 5^ wliich have been enumerated and 

 described in the first pages of this 

 \ohime as Bay Snipe, although, 

 a-i I have before observed, with 

 the exception of the Red-breasted 

 Snipe — Scolopax Novehoracensis — 

 known generally as the Quail 

 Snipe, or Dowitcher, and the Semipalmated Snipe, or Willet, 

 there is not one among them wliich has even a pretension to be 

 called Snipe, 



All the different tribes which pass under this wholly inappro- 

 priate and unscientific name, are, as we have seen, permanent 

 dwellers during the whole year, with the exception of a brief 

 period during the breeding season, of some or other portion of 

 the United States. Wintering southward, they pass north and 

 eastward during the spring, and almost before the summer is 

 spent, are on the coasts of JMassachusetts, New- York, and New- 

 Jersey, with their young broods. 



Like all those birds which visit these States, on their way to 

 breed in the spring, and return in the autumn, these are far 

 tamer and more settled, and make a much longer sojourn on 

 our coasts at the latter than at the former period ; and from 

 Boston Bay to Egg Harbor, the shores swarm wherever there 

 are appropriate feeding places, with these countless aquatic 

 myriads. 



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