BIRDS HUNTED FOR FOOD OR SPORT. 299 



but a good bird caller finds no difficulty in luring it to his 

 decoys. 



The breeding range and migration of this species are more 

 or less shrouded in mystery. The eggs have been found once 

 by MacFarlane in the Anderson River region, which proves 

 that the birds breed near the coast of the Arctic Sea, and that 

 is about all we know of its breeding range, except that it sum- 

 mers in Keewatin. Audubon was informed that this species 

 bred in the Magdalen and Prince Edward islands, and Mr. 

 Fletcher Osgood believes that once it bred on the Lynn Marshes 

 in Massachusetts, but there is no conclusive evidence that it 

 ever bred in New England or the Maritime Provinces. It 

 formerly appeared rarely on the coast of Maine and more 

 commonly in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and New York 

 (Long Island) . Farther south it appears always to have been 

 rather rare in the United States. We must assume that the 

 species goes to South America by sea, like the Eskimo Curlew, 

 and lands on Cape Cod and Long Island in numbers only 

 when driven there by storms. It was considered rare by 

 Wilson and Audubon, as it probably never was seen on the 

 coast of the middle and southern States in any numbers unless 

 driven in by a severe storm. On August 13, 1903, a large 

 flight occurred on the Long Island coast, and many were killed, 

 but little was heard of them to the southward. The only flight 

 of Godwits that is shown on the record of Chatham Beach 

 Hotel for seven years is in August, 1903. No birds were taken 

 on the 13th, when the great flight appeared on Long Island, 

 for at Chatham the weather apparently was fair, with a west 

 wind. One bird, perhaps a straggler from the Long Island 

 flight, was picked up on the 20th, after a southeast wind had 

 blown for two days. On the 26th a northeast wind set in, and 

 it blew from the east or northeast for six days. On the 29th 

 seven Godwits were killed. During the seven years for which 

 the record was kept Godwits were taken only singly or in 

 pairs, with the above exception, and the record shows forty- 

 two killed all told. Twenty -four were taken during east, north 

 or northeast winds; eight in northwest winds; six in southwest 

 winds; two in west winds, and only one in a south wind. 



