Lake Umbagog
1900.
Sept. 14
  Sunny, the sky half filled with cloud masses driving
rapidly before the violent, gusty N.W. wind. A superb sunset.
Warm at midday, cool in the early morning & at evening.
  There has been no change in the foliage as yet save with
the birches about the camp many of whose leaves have withered
& fallen. The maples remain as green as in midsummer.
  The Stones and I left camp at 9 A.M. crossed the Lake
and started down the Androscoggin. Opposite Leonard's Pond
we found Mr. Dutoon beating the marshes for Snipe. As I
was watching him I discovered four large waders which
I took at first for Summer Yellow legs feeding on a space
of bare mud on the edge of the river. Dutton soon saw
them too & approaching fired several shorts killing three
of them. Before this slaughter was completed and while
the frightened birds were dashing back & forth over the flats I
recognized them as Red breasted Snipe, a species new to my
Umbagog list. On landing and examining the three that Mr. Dutton
had killed I found that they were all typical griseus
and all young birds. They were in curiously colored being neither
in the brown-backed, red-breasted summer plumage nor in
the gray and white winter dress but having the brown of the
upper & the red of the lower parts overlaid or clouded with
grayish through which the richer colors showed indistinctly or
through a veil. I think I have seen this plumage before in
specimens shot late in September or early in October. It is apparently
a transition state between the summer & winter plumages.
Red-breasted
Snipe
  Beside the Red-breasted Snipe Dutton flushed a member of Wilson's
Snipe while we were watching him. He & Harry Russell who was
with him had also killed a Carolina Rail and two
Lesser Yellow-legs.
Wilson's
Snipe
Lesser Yellow-
legs
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