120 Bird-Lore 



most plantations the Plover, as the two species are indiscriminatelj^ called, 

 are wisely protected. 



I know of few facts pertaining to birds that are stranger than the 

 yearly migrations of the Plover, the Turnstone and the Tattler to and 

 from these islands. Leaving Hawaii in April by thousands and returning 

 in August and September, in the interim they brave the passage each way 

 of some three thousand miles of ocean, more or less, according to the 

 point of the American continent they steer for. What a wearisome flight 

 across the watery wastes these trips must be! If a storm is encountered 

 thousands must perish, and under any circumstances no doubt many find 

 a watery grave. Wing power has its limits, and many a brave bird heart 

 homeward bound is each year forever stilled in the remorseless waters as 

 strength fails and the never ceasing wing-beats grow fewer and feebler 

 till the end comes. 



Why do these birds insist upon such long and dangerous journeys? 

 Their first discovery of Hawaii must have been accidental. A southward 

 migration of Plover and Turnstones was, doubtless, interrupted by a storm. 

 The birds were blown out to sea and, bravely striving against fate, the 

 fortunate survivors discovered Hawaii many centuries before the English 

 navigator was born. But when once the ''Paradise of the Pacific" was 

 discovered, why leave it ? Why brave the weary and dangerous journey 

 Iback ? The temperature varies but little in Hawaii the year round. The 

 uplands frequented by the birds are cool at all times of the year; appar- 

 ently, too, they offer as much food in summer as in winter. Perhaps in 

 time the birds will come to realize the advantages of a permanent resi- 

 dence in Hawaii. But first they must overcome that passion — the most 

 powerful that stirs the avian brain — the homing instinct, which impels 

 them to leave Hawaii's hospitable shores for the far away Alaska for no 

 other reason than that they have always done so. In the far north they 

 first saw the light, in the far north they reared last year's brood, and 

 back to the far north they must hark at the cost of no matter what 



danger and fatigue. Like the Tattler, both the Plover and the Turnstone 

 leave a contingent in Hawaii, which consists, as in the case of the former, 



of the young and the decrepit. 



But three other coast inhabitants remain to be mentioned, for the 



Bristle-thighed Curlew, or Kiowea, is so rare upon this island that I 



have never seen one. 



In some respects the Noddy Tern, or Nolo, is the most notable and 



interesting of all Hawaii's coast birds, but its distribution is very local. 



Long sections, in fact, of Hawaii's coast line appear to be without these 



interesting birds, perhaps because of the absence of proper cliff shelters. 



Upon the ledges of cliffs and upon the shelves of rocky caves the Noddies 



doze away their idle hours by day and roost at night. Here upon the 



i 



