THE WILD FOWL OF THE ST. LAWRENCE RIVER. 365 



Description. "Adult male. Black, a white spot about the eye; bill orange, 

 black at base. Female. Dusky brown above; lighter below." This species has 

 also "a white patch on the wing; feathers extending forward along the sides 

 and top of the bill nearly to the nostrils." 



Geese. 



Order Anseres. Family Anatidae. 



Of these, there is but a single species that may be said to frequent the 

 St. Lawrence river, or the islands and bays at the foot of Lake Ontario; it is 

 the Hutchins goose {Canadensis hutchinsii). 



This species is smaller than the common wild goose {Branta canadensis), but it 

 is marked almost identically the same, and hence I do not deem it necessary to 

 append a description. 



Occasionally a specimen of the common brant {Br ant a bernicla) is taken here, 

 but they are by no means common. They are highly esteemed for table use, but 

 it is very seldom that the hunter is enabled to gratify his palate with a taste of 

 this delicious goose. 



3l)Ore lairds {Limicolae). 



Of this order, two families, snipes {Scolopacidae) and plovers {Charadridae) 

 with a single individual of the Aprizidae, the turnstone, are all that are repre- 

 sented in this region. In mentioning each individual species I have condensed 

 its description as much as possible, confining it to adults entirely. With this 

 explanation, the reader will have no difficulty in the application. Because of 

 their brevity, I have borrowed the descriptions from Chapman's "Color Key 

 to North American Birds " 



The shore birds closely follow the geese and ducks in their northward migra- 

 tion, their stay here being very short. Some of them breed here, and now that 

 the law has designated a close season for them, it is hoped that their numbers 

 will increase. They return from the north late in the summer, but are rarely 

 disturbed now by our local sportsmen, nor are they sufficiently numerous to 

 attract the professional or the 'market hog." I am told by old-time sportsmen 

 that in the early days of snipe and plover shooting in the St. Lawrence River 

 region it was not an uncommon thing to bag a hundred "Wilson plover in a day 

 on the shore of any one of our inland lakes, and that it was no difficult matter 

 to take half as many Avoodcock in the same time. 



