AMERICAN WOODCOCK. 
UITE as interesting in habits is the American Wood- 
Z, cock, the Philohela minor of Gray, which belongs to 
the grallatorial, rather than to the natatorial, family of birds. 
In distribution he is somewhat restricted, differing in this 
respect from his numerous congeneric brethren, which have 
a wide dispersion. He is chiefly a denizen of the eastern 
parts of the United States, and of the British territory im- 
mediately adjacent. Fort Rice, in north-western Dakota, 
and Kansas and Nebraska in the West, appear to be the 
limits of his range in these directions. In the Middle and 
Eastern States Woodcocks are found in greater abundance 
than anywhere else. While the bulk pass North to breed, 
a few remain in the South and raise their happy little families 
in spite of the ardor of the climate. 
Few migrants arrive earlier at their breeding-grounds. 
They usually appear from the fifth to,the tenth of March in 
New England and the Middle Atlantic States, although 
instances are recorded where they have been observed as 
early as the twenty-fourth of Feburary. These cases are 
rare, however, and only happen, if at all, when the weather 
has been remarkably auspicious for a lengthy spell. As a 
few birds have been known to winter in the North, when 
the season has been unusually mild, their emergence from 
sheltered localities so early might be construed by persons 
not cognizant of their presence, or of their occasional winter 
sojourn, as a case of recent arrival. In view of this fact, it 
would be difficult to prove that a bird seen in winter had 
just come from the South, unless discovered 77 transitu. 
