290 GAME BIRDS, WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



SANDERLING {Calidris leucophcea). 

 Common or local names: Beach-bird; Whitey; Beach Plover; Bull-peep. 



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Length. — 7.50 to 8 inches; bill averages about .77; no hind toe. 

 Adult in Spring. — Head, back, sides of neck and upper breast varied with 

 rufous, brown and black, the feathers largely centered with black, edged 

 with pale rufous and tipped or frosted with grayish white; rump dark 

 brown; tail grayish brown; under parts white; wings grayish, marked 

 with whitish, showing a band of white on secondaries when spread. 

 AduU in Fall. — Above pale gray, the shaft lines of each feather black; below 



pure white. 

 Young. — Gray above, spotted with black and white; hind neck dusky 

 white; throat and breast washed with buff or dusky, rest of under parts 

 white; wings as in adult; iris hazel; bill, legs and feet always dark. 

 Field Marks. — In fall the general whitish appearance and the black bill. 



Sand beaches. 

 Notes. — A short chit (Hoffmann). A rasping note and a peeping note, some- 

 times also a sharp grasshopper-like sound. The flight song in spring a 

 quavering trill. 

 Season. — Common spring and fall migrant coastwise, and rare winter resi- 

 dent; rarer in interior; most common in late May, early June, July, 

 August and September; non-breeding birds formerly summered here. 

 Range. — Northern and southern hemispheres. Breeds from Melville 

 Island, EUesmere Land and northern Greenland to Point Barrow, 

 Alaska, northern Mackenzie, Iceland and in northern Siberia; winters 

 from central California, Texas, Virginia and Bermuda to Patagonia, 

 and casually to Massachusetts and Washington; also from the Mediter- 

 ranean, Burma and Japan to South Africa and various Pacific islands, 

 including Hawaii. 



History. 

 It is half tide on Cape Cod. Great waves heave high their 

 tossing heads, which, curhng, break and thunder down in 

 sheets of snowy foam that overwhelm the beach, charging for- 

 ward and upward across the sloping sands almost to the very 



