EXPEDITION TO POINT BARROW, ALASKA. 113 



539a. PELIDNA ALPINA AMERICANA Case. 



REDBACKED SANDPIPKU (Mf-' 



This species is common and breeds abundantly, although the nest is exceedingly liard to find, 

 ns the nesting birds are very wary and use every possible strategem to mislead one while looking 

 for the eggs. 



They arrive about the end of May. In ISSj they first appeared above (.lie station in small 

 flocks iissoc.iiit.ing with the, Golden 1 'lovers, but the next spring the snow was slow in going oft' 

 from this part of the tundra, and they were first noted below the village. 



Some of them, perhaps, arrive paired, but the majority are pairing soon after their arrival, to 

 judge by their actio?is. They scatter in pairs and threes all over the tundra, where then; is still at 

 this time a good deal of snow, and chase, each other with much noise, talcing wing suddenly without 

 cause for alarm. 



One will occasionally "set" his wings while in the air and soar for some distance, uttering a 

 note quite different from the usual hoarse, rolling call. 



As the tundra gradually clears of snow, they become more scattered and spread farther inland, 

 deserting the shores of the beach lagoons, although they hardly confine themselves as much to the 

 dry portions of the tundra as the Baird's Sandpipers are in the habit of doing. 



Their rolling call through June is to be heard all day and every day, and reminds one of the 

 notes of the frogs in Xew England in spring. In fact, some members of the party came home the 

 first spring convinced that they had heard the frogs piping. 



The nest, which is like that o&all the rest of the waders, is always placed in the grass, some- 

 times in dry and sometimes in lather swampy places, but never on the black tundra or on the 

 isthmuses between the ponds like the 1'halaropcs. 



The eggs were first described from the Mackenzie region, by Richardson (Fauna Boreali- 

 Amcricana, II, 383), but appear to be still little known in collections. 



Both parents share in the work of incubation, though we happened to obtain more males than 

 females with the. eggs. 



The young arc pretty generally hatched by the first week in July, and both adults and young 

 keep pretty well out of sight till the first of August, when they begin to show about the lagoons 

 and occasionally about the beach, many of the young birds still downy about the head. 



The autumn flight of young birds appears about the middle of August, associating with the 

 young .1. maculata and M. griscun wolopacniH, in good-sized flocks, particularly about the pools 

 on the high tundra below Cape Smythe. 



r They continue plenty in these localities, sometimes appearing along the beach, for about a 

 week, when the greater part of them depart, leaving only a few stragglers that stay till the first 

 few days of September. 



540. PELIDNA SUBARQUATA (Quid.) Cuv. 



CUELEW SANDPIPER. 



The Curlew Sandpiper has never been before noted as occurring anywhere in America except 

 npon the Atlantic coast, where it is a rare straggler. 



I had the good fortune to capture a male in full breeding plumage, the only one seen, on June 

 G, 1883. It was in company with a good-sized flock of Actodromas maculata. 



541. EREUNETES PUSILLUS (Linn.) Case. 

 SEMIPAL5IATED SANDPIPER 



This species is a regular and fairly abundant fall visitor at 'Point Barrow, coming apporcntly 

 from the east in large flocks. 



None were, seen cither season during the spring migrations or the breeding season, lint alvout 

 the end of July they appeared in large numbers, arriving at Pergniak first and spreading down 

 the co, i si. 



II, Ex. 41 - 15 



