492 GAME BIRDS OF CALIFORNIA 



ting, heaving and working hard to dislodge them. Sometimes it pushes with its 

 breast against a stone or shell in the effort to overturn it, or even digs beneath 

 to undermine it when it is too firmly imbedded to be moved otherwise. It 

 turns over bundles of seaweed, and 'roots' out weeds and sea mosses, as Dr. 

 Townseud says "like a little pig." These labors are undertaken in the hope 

 of finding something eatable beneath such objects, and the little laborer often 

 is rewarded. Dawson states that near the shores of Lake Erie he has seen 

 it on the ploughed lands turning over clods bigger than itself with such force 

 as to roll them a foot or more. This habit of turning objects is not constant, 

 however, with this bird, and is sometimes the exception, as I have watched it 

 when it seemed to be occupied entirely in probing the sand, or searching for 

 food, like a sandpiper, along the strand. 



The Turnstone can swim well at need, and like some other species loves to 

 bathe in the wash of the waves that roll up on the sands, where it shakes off 

 the water like a little dog. 



"W. A. Bryan (1903, pp. 210-211) tells of an interesting experience 

 with an individual of the Common Turnstone, a bird closely related 

 to the Ruddy, which came aboard a vessel in the Pacific Ocean. The 

 bird was placed in a cage on shipboard and offered the canned flesh 

 of various animals such as oysters and clams, and also fresh fish. 

 These were all refused. Then some live cockroaches, the only live 

 insects available, were introduced. The bugs would scurry under 

 stones in the bottom of the cage, whereupon the Turnstone would roll 

 each stone to one side and snap up any bug which might be uncovered. 

 Then it would beat the insect vigorously on the floor several times and 

 finally swallow it. 



According to Cooke (1910, p. 97) authentic records of the nesting 

 of the Ruddy Turnstone are still very rare. The breeding range of 

 the Turnstone of the Eastern Hemisphere extends east into Alaska, 

 and the line dividing the breeding range of this subspecies (interpres) 

 from that of the Ruddy, which nests in boreal America to the east- 

 ward, has not yet been clearly marked off. Reed (1904, p. 132) 

 records a set of eggs (of morinella) taken June 28, 1900, on the 

 Mackenzie River; while MacFarlane (1891, p. 430) speaks of finding 

 birds at Fort Anderson in June, 1864, and of taking eggs on the 

 Lower Anderson River, on a date not specified. 



The nest is said to be usually placed along the shore of a body 

 of water, on a sandy or stony area, and like that of most other waders, 

 is a mere depression in the surface, sometimes lined with . a few 

 grasses or dead leaves. The eggs are usually four in number, pear- 

 shaped, and measure in inches, 1.60 to 1.72 by 1.13 to 1.23, averaging 

 1.66 by 1.18. The ground-color is cream or light drab or deep clay, 

 with superficial markings of light brown, boldly splashed about the 

 larger end; there are also deeper-lying lilac markings (Baird, Brewer 

 and Ridgway, 1884, I, p. 124). 



