110 



FAMILY APHRI2ID.E. SURF-BIRDS AND TURNSTONES. 



General Description. Medium-sized Shore Birds with bill (Figure 27, p. 22) moder- 

 ately short, horny for the terminal half, tip slightly flattened (in a horizontal plane) but 

 not distinctly enlarged as in the Plover. 



A small family of world-wide distribution. Only one species of this 

 family in eastern Canada. 



Subfamily — Arenariinae. Turnstones. 



Genus — Arenaria. Turnstones. 

 283a. Turnstone, ruddy Turnstone. American Turnstone, carriquet plover. 



CALICO PLOVER. FR. — LE TOURNE-PIERRE A. POITRINE NOIRE. LE TOURNE-PIERRE. Arenaria 



interpres. L, 9-50. 



Distinctions. A strikingly coloured bird. Back in rather broad masses of dull red, 

 black, and white more or less intermixed. Rump and head white, the crown striped with 

 brown or black. Underparts pure white, with black breast-band, extending up side of neck 

 to face where it makes a circle through the eye and around a white loral spot. Autumn 

 birds have the colours subdued and the back coloration lost or only faintly represented, 

 but enough of the face and breast markings always remain to suggest the above diagnosis. 



Field Marks. The peculiar pied coloration in red, black, and white of the spring 

 plumage. In the autumn the white lower back and uppertail-coverts separated by a dark 

 bar. 



Nesting. Depression in the ground lined with a few dead leaves or vegetable fibres. 



Distribution. The Turnstone as a species has one of the widest distributions of any 

 bird, there being few countries where it has not occurred. The American subspecies, 

 the Ruddy Turnstone, breeds from the Arctic coast west of Hudson bay northward, and 

 ia more common on the Atlantic than the Pacific coast; locally common, in migration, 

 in the Great Lakes region. 



SUBSPECIES. The Turnstone is represented in America by a subspecies, the 

 Ruddy Turnstone A. i. morinella, though the typical form is said to occur in western 

 Alaska. 



A bird of sandy, muddy, or rocky shores, but preferring the first. 

 It is named from its habit of turning over small stones and pebbles on the 

 beach searching for food beneath them, and it is astonishing what com- 

 paratively large stones it can move. It inserts its bill under the edge, 

 gives a little fillip, and away goes the stone rolling or skidding over the 

 beach to a considerable distance. It is a fairly- good swimmer. 

 It differs from the Old World Turnstone only in slightly smaller size, less 

 black on the upperparts, and the stronger coloration of the legs. 



FAMILY HjEMATOPODID^. OYSTER-CATCHERS. 



General Description. Large Shore Birds more heavily built than is usual in the order; 

 bill stout and horny, extraordinarily flattened laterally (sideways) at tip. There is only 

 one species that may perhaps occur in eastern Canada. 



Genus — Hcematopus. Oyster-catchers. 



286. American Oyster-catcher, pr. — l'huItmer d'amerique. Hcematopus paUiatus. 

 L, 19. Head, neck, and upper breast, black; back, olive brown with contrasting white 

 wing-patch and rump. All underparts, pure white; bill, large, bright red. 



Distribution. Atlantic coast north to Virginia; formerly to New Jersey and accidental 

 in New Brunswick. Probably it originally bred throughout its range. 



The northern range of this striking bird was once on our southern 

 sea-coasts. It has long been regarded as extinct in Canada and there is 

 little chance of its occurring again. 



