242 THE GAME BIRDS AND WILD FOWL 



before the end of October, and most of the birds have departed 

 again by the end of March ; but Hodgson states that in Nepal it 

 arrives in September, and stays a month before passing south, 

 and returns in March and April. This bird not only frequents 

 the mud-flats and saltings, but more inland marshes and the wet, 

 boggy parts of moors. At its winter quarters in India it is found 

 inland near broads and swamps, usually in the vicinity of rice- 

 fields, and on the banks of the larger rivers ; but in more littoral 

 districts it affects the mud-flats of estuaries by preference. This 

 Godwit usually walks with rather slow, deliberate steps, but it is 

 capable of running very quickly, and often wades in the shallows. 

 Sometimes it sleeps while standing in water up to the breast, with 

 the long neck and bill nestled in the dorsal plumage. In India, 

 they are said to be much more easily approached when in flocks 

 than when in pairs, or alone ; but curiously enough the reverse is 

 often the case on our coasts. It may frequently be seen in 

 marshy meadows, and occasionally frequents long grass almost as 

 tall as itself. This Godwit, whilst on passage, is remarkably 

 restless, and shifts its ground a good deal, but when once fairly 

 settled in its winter quarters it continues to visit certain feeding 

 grounds for many weeks in succession. In India Hume states that 

 although they have certain spots, especially rice stubbles and fields 

 and patches of wild rice, to which they resort for several hours 

 during the day to feed, they also feed at other times in 

 places to which they resort for the remainder of the day. The 

 food of the Black-tailed Godwit consists of worms, insects and 

 their larvae, crustaceans, sand-worms, and snails. In summer 

 this food is varied with shoots and roots of aquatic plants ; and 

 in winter, according to Hume, rice, whenever available, both 

 cultivated and wild, is this Godwit's favourite food, in addition to 

 which it eats great quantities of millet seed, and the seeds of 

 grass and sedges. Its kind of food, this writer informs us, depends 

 a good deal on what may chance to be to hand, and its gizzard 

 is usually crammed with one variety alone. The call-note of the 

 Black-tailed Godwit resembles the syllables tyil-it, but its alarm 

 note is a loud and clear tyil, tyil, most persistently uttered when 

 the breeding grounds are invaded by man. 



