XLIII 



OTHER SNIPES AND SANDPIPERS 



HAVING described the method of pursuit, we now 

 come to consider the birds, to look over the 

 bag, as it were, handling them one by one, to see what 

 birds are worth the powder and to throw out those en- 

 tirely worthless, which should not have found a place 

 in the bag. 



The desirable birds of the snipe and sandpiper family 

 (in addition to the woodcock, snipe, and upland plover, 

 or Bartramian sandpiper), are twelve in number : The 

 dowitcher or red-breasted snipe, the knot, the dunlin, 

 the marbled godwit, the Hudsonian godwit, the greater 

 yellow-legs, the lesser yellow-legs, the willet, three cur- 

 lews, and the pectoral sandpiper. 



All but the last named and the dunlin are birds of fair 

 size, good marks, and fairly good to eat when their 

 food does not give them a too " fishy " taste. The pec- 

 toral sandpiper is a small bird, but its flesh is better for 

 the table than that of many others, and on this account 

 it properly finds a place in the bag. This bird is in 

 some localities known as the jack-snipe, a name more 

 often applied to the true snipe (scolopax). 



We proceed to consider these larger birds in their 

 order, and since all the shore birds, big and small, 

 under existing game laws are considered game, we 

 have listed the smaller varieties in the appendix, suffi- 



2g4 



