24 Fragments of Natural History. 



for two or three weeks. Its favorite resort is the tops of the 

 highest beach trees at the time the buds are bursting into leaves. 



The willet, {Totanus semipalmatus,) Mr. Audubon says, "are 

 very seldom met with far inland," and " I have little doubt that 

 those seen by Mr. Say on the banks of the Missouri, had acci- 

 dentally visited that country." 



This bird is a common visitor to the shores of Lake Erie, both 

 in the spring and autumn. On the 3d of July, 1838, I shot an 

 old specimen from a flock of more than twenty individuals that 

 were in the habit of visiting the marsh in Ohio City, at the mouth 

 of the Cuyahoga, for a number of days in succession. 



The young birds appeared here on the first of July of the pre- 

 sent year, and considerable numbers have been shot by the sports- 

 men. 



A few years since, they remained here during the whole of the 

 summer, and probably reared their young in the neighborhood. 

 They are very abundant about some of the upper lakes. 



The marbled goodwit, (Limosa fedoa,) occasionally visits the 

 shores of Lake Erie and the Ohio river. The Hon. Mr. Granger 

 has furnished me with a beautiful pair, killed near his residence 

 at Fairport. Several young specimens were shot in this vicinity 

 about the first of August of the present season. They were 

 associating with a flock of long-billed curlews, {Numenius lon- 

 girostris. ) 



The Hudson curlew, [Numenius Hudsonicus,) has been taken 

 in a few instances in Ohio. 1 have a specimen in my cabinet 

 that alighted in the garden of Mr. A. Hayden, of this city, and 

 was shot by him three years since. Another was taken in the 

 vicinity of Cincinnati. 



The piping plover, [Charadrius melodus,) I have seen in two 

 instances on the shore of Lake Erie, and have specimens in my 

 cabinet both in their winter and summer plumage. 



Mr. Audubon informs his readers that " they never proceed to 

 any distance inland even along the sandy margins of our largest 

 rivers." 



Cleveland, Ohio, June 4, 1840. 



