WATER BIRDS. 203 
The Spotted Sandpiper feeds until late in the evening, and possibly is 
more or less nocturnal, since its notes are frequently heard at night when 
it cannot be migrating. Its food consists largely, if not entirely, of animal 
matter, including small aquatic forms of every kind, but it also eats insects 
of various sorts, and according to 8S. E. White, at Mackinac Island, it was 
observed to feed on ‘‘stone spiders.’’ Aughey found it feeding freely on 
locusts in Nebraska in May, 1895, six stomachs containing an aggregate 
of 91 of these injurious insects. 
TECHNICAL DIESCRIPTION. 
Bill about as long as head, stout, slightly decurved, largely yellow toward the base, the 
tip and culmen blackish; legs and feet greenish brown. Adult in summer: Entire upper 
parts grayish or greenish brown, usually with a brassy luster, the head and neck more or 
less streaked and the back and scapulars spotted and barred with black; a dusky loral 
streak (continued back of the eye) bordered above by a whitish stripe; under parts nearly 
pure white, rather thickly dotted with rounded black or dark brown spots, smallest on 
chin and throat, largest on breast and sides; middle tail-feathers olive brown like the back, 
sometimes barred with black, lateral feathers barred with black and white, and with broad 
white tips; wing with two conspicuous white bands, one formed by the white tips of the 
secondaries, the other by the inner webs of most of the primaries and the basal half of all 
the secondaries. Adult in autumn: Without any spots below, and with few or no black 
bars above, but sides of breast shaded with gray. Young: Similar to autumn adult, 
and unspotted below, but with narrow bars of buff and dusky on tips of many upper tail- 
coverts, scapulars and wing-coverts. Length 7 to 8 inches; wing 4.05 to 4.60; culmen .90 
to 1.05; tarsus .90 to 1.05. 
111. Sickle-billed Curlew. Numenius americanus Bechst. (264) 
Synonyms: Sickle-bill, Long-billed Curlew, Big Curlew, Hen Curlew.—Numenius 
longirostris, Wils., 1814, and authors generally——Numenius rufus, Vieill—Numenius 
occidentalis, Woodh. 
Known at a glance by its strongly down-curved bill, from five to eight 
inches long, and its mottled brown and gray plumage. The only other bird 
with a similarly curved bill of this length is the Glossy Ibis, which is readily 
separable by its metallic green, bronze, and chestnut plumage. 
-Distribution.—Temperate North America, migrating south to Guatemala, 
Cuba and Jamacia. Breeds in the South Atlantic States, and in the interior 
through most of its north American range. 
Doubtless this species was once fairly common in the prairie regions 
of southern Michigan before the country was thoroughly cultivated. 
Recent records for the Great Lake region are few and far between, and 
Iam unable to find a single instance of its nesting within our limits, although 
we find the statement in Baird, Brewer and Ridgway’s “Water Birds” 
(Vol. I, 1884, 314). “It is now known that they probably breed in all 
or nearly all the western states north of Ohio and west of Lake Erie.” 
A. B. Covert records the capture of a male in Washtenaw county, Septem- 
ber 12, 1872, and another specimen taken near Ann Arbor “about September 
15, 1877.” According to Norman A. Wood this last specimen is mounted 
and now in the collection of the University of Michigan. A mounted 
specimen, without any label, in the collection of the St. Mary’s Academy, 
Monroe, Michigan, is said to have been collected in that vicinity, and to have 
come from the collection of Father Kilroy. Mr. Ed. Van Winkle, of Van’s 
Harbor, Delta county, says that he has taken specimens there but that 
they are rare. 
The above constitute our only records for the species, although ac- 
cording to Dr. Gibbs one instance of its capture was cited by D. D. 
