208 Two Sandpipers 



gather, and in a rather compact flock are off at a rapid rate, their little 

 wings moving so rapidly that it takes a high speed of the focal-plane 

 shutter to get them sharp on the plate. Circling about, they often return 

 to alight near their starting-point. 



Speaking of photography, the shore-birds are a hard class to catch 

 successfully with the camera, because so small, restless, and dwellers in 

 wide expanses. Not many hunters with the camera can produce good 

 photographs, self-taken, of 'this tribe. It can be done, however, and 

 these little Sandpipers make very pretty subjects. One can attract them 

 to a blind with decoys. I have even had them fly close to Duck decoys, 

 and secured good pictures of them thus, though it probably was mere 

 idle curiosity that drew them. The best chances I ever found to photo- 

 graph these and other shore-birds, except at nesting time, was on the 

 spring migration among the Florida Keys, where the red mangrove grows 



right down to the water's edge, close to the sand-bars, 

 o ograp ing j n winter and spring they are numerous in such 

 Shore-birds , , T i j j 1 



places, and all I had to do was to squat quietly and 



blaze away with my harmless weapon as the unsuspecting birds ran by 

 me, fed, or rested. 



These little nymphs are gleaners, rather than scavengers. Their 

 food, of course, is of very small prey larvae, worms, minute shell-fish, 

 insects, and the like which they pick up on shore or flat, or probe for 

 deeper down. Though we may not be able to assign any definite 

 economic value to these species in dollars and cents, they have a value 

 none the less real and great. Celia Thaxter found genuine happiness 

 with "One little Sandpiper and I !" and so has many another. They 

 have afforded me, hundreds of times, most exquisite delight, and I know 

 that they are worth while. May their numbers greatly increase ! 



Classification and Distribution 



These Sandpipers belong to the Order Limicola and Family Scolopacidce. 



The scientific name of the Least Sandpiper is Pisobia minutilla. It breeds 

 in northern and eastern Canada, and in Alaska, and winters from the southwestern 

 border of the United States to Brazil and Chile. 



The scientific name of the Semipalmated Sandpiper is Ercunetes pusiUus. 

 It breeds in the Arctic regions, and winters from Texas and South Carolina 

 throughout Central and South America. 



This and other Educational Leaflets are for sale, at 5 cents each, by the National Association of 

 Audubon Societies, 1974 Broadway, New York City. Lists given on request. 



