BIRDS HUNTED FOR FOOD OR SPORT. 273 



the ground; or he flies slowly along close to the ground, his 

 head raised high and his tail hanging straight down, uttering 

 a succession of booming notes. As he struts about the female 

 his low notes swell and die away in musical cadences, which, as 

 Nelson describes them, form a striking part of the great bird 

 chorus of the northern wilds. 



As this bird apparently breeds along most of the Arctic 

 coast from Alaska to Ungava, and as it follows the general 

 southeastern direction, which so many northern birds take in 

 the fall, it must always reach the coast of the Maritime 

 Provinces and New England in large numbers, unless it de- 

 creases largely on its breeding grounds. It is believed that 

 birds of this species from northern Siberia which migrate east 

 cross to Alaska and continue southeasterly to the Atlantic 

 coast, ^ for it is found in the Aleutian Islands, but is uncommon 

 farther south on the Pacific coast, and is almost unknown in 

 California. It reappears in Lower California (Brewster), but 

 no one knows how it gets there. The old birds start south in 

 July, and by the end of August a few have reached Argentina. 

 The young birds begin to leave their arctic homes late in 

 August and early in September. Most of the birds of this 

 species killed in Massachusetts are taken between August and 

 November 1. In winter the species dwells in South America. 

 In Argentina and Chile it visits both mountain and plain, and 

 is by no means confined to the sea-coast. 



Insects, shell-fish and vegetable matter have been found 

 in stomachs of this species. Crickets, grasshoppers, ground 

 larvse and earthworms are commonly taken by those which 

 feed inland. 



I Cooke, W. W.: Distribution and Migration of North American Shore Birds, Bull. No. 35, Biol. 

 Surv., 1910, p. 35. 



