MIGRATING SHORE BIRDS 



Notes on Pacific Coast Shore Birds 



By JOHN TREADWELL NICHOLS 



With photographs by the author 



DURING a part of the fall migration season of 1908, the writer was doing 

 work on and near our northern Pacific coast for the United States 

 Bureau of Fisheries, and took much pleasure in the shore birds which 

 were observable there from time to time. 



South, from the mouth of the mighty Columbia river, is a stretch of sand 

 beach which extends to the jutting rocks of Tillamook Head. This beach was 

 visited July 26. Sandpipers and Plovers were here already, migrating southward 

 from- their northern breeding-grounds, as doubtless were their eastern congen- 

 ers at the same time, along the shores of old Atlantic. 



A Sanderling stood out large and pale among Western Sandpipers, which 

 were gleaning along the beach close to the shifting wave-line. A lone Black- 

 bellied Plover was in handsome plumage, with black underparts and a little 

 Ring-neck Plover seemed indeed like a friend from home. 



The big timber of the Pacitic slope does not extend far to the east. Tall 

 mountains shut off the moisture of the ocean, on which it is dependent, and 

 eastern Washington is a dry, treeless country. About August i. Crab Creek, a 

 clear, cold trout brook, north of the town of Ritzville, Washington, was visited. 

 The drive to the creek from Ritzville is across a rolling, dusty grain country, 

 where one of the many races of Horned Lark was abundant. The rocky slope 

 from upland down to the creek is cultivated, covered with a scanty mantle of 

 rank, s[)icy, sage bush. A band of vegetation, grass, bushes, small trees, etc., 

 clings close to the creek. Here was the eastern Kingbird, and at one point some 

 American Magjjies. Nighthawks were common, and frequently seen flying about 

 in the bright desert sunshine, and Mourning Doves were much in evidence. 

 Uf shore birds, Killdeers were very prominent and noisy, a few Spotted Sand- 



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