PURPLE SANDPIPER. 33 
more to the northward. 'August is the month of principal migra- 
tion from Maine to South America, and this month also witnesses 
the departure from the breeding grounds. The last one seen at 
Floeberg Beach was August 29, 1875 (Feilden); Point Barrow, August 
17, 1898 (Stone); Homer, Alaska, August 23, 1901; Winter Island, 
Melville Peninsula, August 17, 1822 (Greely): During the summer 
of 1822 the entire stay of the knot on Winter Island was only sixty- 
two days—one of the shortest nesting periods of any species. 
Purple Sandpiper. Arquatella maritima (Briinn.). 
Breeding range.—The purple sandpiper is principally a bird of the 
Old World, breeding on the Arctic coast and islands from north- 
western Siberia to Iceland. In Greenland it is known on the east 
coast to Shannon Island, latitude 75° N. (Schalow); and on the 
west to Thank God Harbor, 81° 40’ N. (Bessels); and probably it 
breeds at least as far north as latitude 72°. A few were seen at Fort 
Conger, on Grinnell Land (Greely); several at various times in ‘the 
fall around Wellington Channel (McCormick); and the species was 
‘found common in summer on Banks (Armstrong) and Melville (Ross) 
islands. The Banks Island record at latitude 74° N., longitude 
118° W., marks the extreme northwestern range of the species. To 
‘the westward of this it is replaced by couest. The southern limit of 
the breeding range appears to extend from the southern end of 
Greenland to the base of the Melville Peninsula, and possibly to the 
northern shores of Hudson Bay.* The species breeds most commonly 
on the shores of Baffin Bay and Davis Strait. 
Winter range.—The purple sandpiper remains the farthest north 
in winter of any of the shorebirds. It is said to winter sometimes 
even in southern Greenland (Hagerup), and it is common in winter 
from Nova Scotia (Sharpe) and New Brunswick(Macoun) southward 
to the coast of Rhode Island (Howe and Sturtevant). It is a,rare 
but regular winter visitant to Long Island, New York (Dutcher), and 
has occurred casually thence south to the Bermudas (Reid), Georgia 
(Sennett), and Florida (Scott). The species is rare anywhere away 
from the ocean, but has been noted a few times in the vicinity of the 
Great Lakes. 
Spring migration.—Some dates of spring arrival are: Winter Island, 
June 10, 1822 (Greely); Igloolik, June 14, 1823 (Greely); Cam- 
bridge Bay, June 10, 1853 (Greely); Bay of Mercy, June 3, 1852 
(Armstrong) ; Cumberland Sound, June 4, 1878 (Kumlien); Prince 
of Wales Sound, Ungava, May 27, 1886 (Payne); west coast of 
Greenland at latitude 72° N., May 29, 1850 (Sutherland). The last 
usually desert the New England coast in March. 
Fall migration. —Oceasionally a stray bird appears in September 
on the New England coast, but the main flocks do not arrive until 
36595°—Bull. 35—-12——3 
