WILSON'S SNIPE. 



437 



I know of none among our other game birds that are more 

 uncertain and fickle in their habits. On one day a tract of 

 meadows will seem to be almost crowded with them, and 

 on the next not a bird is to be seen. Sometimes they will 

 lie so well before the dog that every bird in the meadow 

 may be picked up consecutively and saved ; while at other 

 times they are so wild that the single discharge of a gun 

 will send every Snipe " scaaping " high into the air and 

 away to other meadows. 



Often have I when hunting wild Ducks, while stationed 

 out in the meadows in my " stand, : ' early in the morning, 

 heard and seen scores of Snipe around me in the grass and 

 sedge feeding and moving about. Yet when the sun had 

 risen, and further chance for work among the Ducks was 

 not to be expected, on searching for the many Snipe I had 

 seen but an hour or two before, and which I supposed were 

 scattered in the meadows about me, not a bird was to be dis- 

 covered. They had stopped to feed in the night and at 

 sunrise had moved on. 



In the spring migrations while with us, they appear to 

 be pairing ; and, although associating in small detached 

 flocks, they are most often found in pairs by themselves. It 

 is during this season that the male performs his well-known 

 gyrations in the air ; he ascends to a considerable height, 

 early in the evening, and, almost in the manner of the 

 Xight-hawk, dives toward the earth, uttering his bleating 

 cry, and peculiar rumbling sound with his extended wings. 

 The Snipe forms a loose nest of grass and a few leaves, on 

 the ground, in a bog or wet swampy thicket ; and about 

 the first week in May the female lays three or four eggs. 

 These are more pyriform in shape than those of the 

 "Woodcock, and average about l.-ii by 1.15 inch in di- 

 mensions. Their color is an olivaceous drab, marked with 

 spots of brown, which are, at the greater end, confluent 

 into blotches, which almost entirely hide the ground- 

 color. 



