130 BIRDS OF THE HUMBER DISTRICT. 



Their winter movements are as erratic as their 

 flight, and most difficult to account for ; sometimes 

 equally plentiful in the mildest and the hardest win- 

 ters, they are at other times as unaccountably scarce. 

 I have known them in some of the severest seasons, 

 with long periods of frost and snow (as was the case 

 in the severe winter of 1860-61), most plentiful on 

 our open drains, springs, and water-courses, whilst 

 in the very similar winter of 1870-71 they almost to 

 a bird left the district. Snipe have paired by the 

 first week in March, and should never be shot after 

 this date. They leave us for their northern breeding- 

 stations about the second week in April. 



I have on two or three occasions both seen and 

 shot a very large Snipe in these marshes, answering to 

 the Scolopax russata of Mr. Gould. In its habits it 

 differs from the common species in being found 

 solitary, rising without any cry, and in its flight, which 

 is both slower and more direct than that of its con- 

 gener, resembling very much the flight of a Wood- 

 cock. 



181. SCOLOPAX GALLINULA, Lhmseus. Jack Snipe. 

 Provincial. Half Snipe. 



Less numerous than the preceding, in the propor- 

 tion of about a third of the common species, and in 

 some localities about half. Whilst there has been in 

 late years a decided decrease in the number of the 

 " Full Snipe " visiting this district, I am inclined to 



