56 Staten Island Association of Arts and Sciences 



sandpiper's observation towers were removed, except one, and 

 this was placed in a tempting position. The camera was con- 

 cealed in some grasses, and was completely buried under drift 

 material and small sods. A thread had been attached to spring 

 the shutter, and, after causing the bird to leave the nest, I retired 

 to a distance of thirty yards, took the thread in my hand and 

 waited. Much to my satisfaction the sandpiper, in working her 

 way back toward the nest, ran nimbly across an open place and 

 made straight for the hummock in front of the camera. In 

 another second her light breast appeared at the top of the clod, 

 and the thread was pulled with much vigor. Although this inci- 

 dent occurred a quarter of a mile from Wolfe's Pond (the scene 

 of all of the other sandpiper pictures), it serves as a fitting intro- 

 duction to this paper. 



Wolfe's Pond is perhaps the most peculiarly located body of 

 fresh water on Staten Island. Along one portion of it a mere 

 neck of land, less than fifty yards across at the narrowest point, 

 separates it from the salt water of the ocean. An outlet at one 

 end forms a creek which flows finally into Raritan Bay, but almost 

 every spring there comes a storm that swells the pond until it 

 overflows its banks and rushes out by the shortest route to join 

 forces with the sea. At the other end, something less than half 

 a mile away, the pond extends far up into a woodland where it 

 receives water from a brook for a part of the year. On the east- 

 erly side a grassy pasture slope extends up from the shore of the 

 pond, and on the westerly there are farm lands, a small pasture, 

 and the barnyard of a dairy. 



The first experiment with the sandpipers took place along the 

 easterly shore. The camera (.an old fashioned Blair, and the only 

 one I possessed at that time) was placed on the ground near 

 the water's edge and focused on some point to which a sandpiper 

 was expected to come. Then it was covered with weeds and 

 tufts of grass, and made to look as inconspicuous as possible. A 

 thread was stretched some distance up the shore and everything 

 was in readiness for the sandpiper. It was generally not long 



