THE SNIPE 269 



meadows of New England and west as far as Dakota, 

 where they were fairly abundant about the small 

 streams and lakes. Nowhere are they as abundant to- 

 day as about the prairie sloughs in the Western and 

 Southern States. 



Audubon says the snipe is never found in the woods, 

 but Forester mentions finding it in wild, windy weather 

 early in the season in the skirts of moist woodlands 

 under sheltered lee-sides of young plantations, among 

 willow, alder, and brier brakes, and, in short, wherever 

 there is good soft, springy feeding-ground perfectly 

 sheltered and protected from the wind by trees and 

 shrubbery. Abbott says : " During the autumn I have 

 found them along neglected meadow ditches overhung 

 by large willow-trees, and again hidden in the reeds 

 along the banks of creeks. I have shot them repeat- 

 edly in wet woodland meadows." I have often found 

 snipe in bushy tracts and among the swamp willows, 

 but I have never seen them in the forest, and believe 

 they so rarely resort to the woods that it would not 

 be worth while to seek them there. 



From the middle of March to the middle of April 

 we may look for the arrival of the snipe. They seem 

 to know in some way, we know not how, when the 

 frost is out of the ground, and suddenly make their 

 appearance in great numbers. Where there were no 

 birds one day there may be thousands the next. Their 

 going is equally sudden. After a real warm day in the 

 spring and at the first hard frost in the autumn not 

 one will be found remaining. There is so much un- 

 certainty about the time of arrival and departure that 

 I would advise sportsmen living at a distance from the 



