124 
PFLECOCIAL GRALLATORES — LIMICOL.E. 
usually remains longer in one place than most Waders. When on the wing it is said 
to utter a loud twittering note. It can be readily reconciled to confinement, and will 
feed on a variety of food, quite different from that which it seeks in a wild state. 
Rev. Dr. Bachman once kept a bird of this species alive. It had recovered from a 
slight wound, when he presented it to a lady who fed it on boiled rice and bread soaked 
in milk, of both of which it was quite fond. It became perfectly gentle, and fed 
from the hand of its mistress, frequently bathed in a vessel kept at hand for that 
purpose, and never attempted to escape, although left quite at liberty to do so. Mr. 
Audubon, in the neighborhood of St. Augustine, Florida, saw this Turnstone feed- 
ing on the oyster-beds, searching for such oysters as had been killed by the heat of 
the sun, and picking out the contents ; it would also strike at such small bivalves 
as had thin shells, and break them. While on the Florida coast, near Cape Sable, 
he shot one, in the month of May, which had its stomach filled with the beautiful 
shells, which on account of their resemblance to grains of rice are commonly called 
rice-shells. 
Mr. MacFarlane met with a flock of about a dozen of these birds at Fort An- 
derson, June, 1864, and obtained a single specimen. They were seen on the river 
below the fort. He was informed by the Esquimaux that this species was tolerably 
numerous on the Arctic coast as well as on the islands in Liverpool Bay. Except 
on the large island in Franklin Bay, where several of this species were seen in July, 
1864, Mr. MacEarlane’s party noticed none of these birds, either on the “Barren 
Grounds,” or on any part of the coast visited by them. He afterward met with them 
on the Lower Anderson, and found two nests, both precisely similar to those of the 
other Waders, consisting of a few withered leaves placed in a depression in the 
ground, each containing four eggs. 
Mr. H. W. Elliott states that this bird visits the Prybilof Islands, arriving in flocks 
of thousands about the third week in July, and leaving September 10, but not breeding 
there. On its arrival it is quite poor ; but feeding on the larva* on the killing-grounds, 
it rapidly fattens, and often bursts open as it falls to the ground after having been 
shot. Mr. Elliott met with this bird at sea, eight hundred miles from the nearest 
land, flying in a northwesterly direction towards the Aleutian Islands. 
The eggs of few species of Waders vary more than do those of the Turnstone. 
They vary in shape from a rounded to an oblong ovoid, in length from 1.60 to 1.72 
inches, and in breadth from 1.13 to 1.23 inches, averaging about 1.66 by 1.18. Their 
ground-colors are a light olive-brown, a cream color, a light drab, and a deep clay- 
color. The eggs are deeply and boldly marked, chiefly about the larger end, with 
large splashes and blotches of light-brown, in some washed with a lilac shade, and in 
others with a tinge of bronze. 
Strepsilas melanocephalus. 
BLACK TURNSTONE. 
Strepsilas melanocephalus, Vigors, Zool. Journ. IV. Jan. 1829, 356 ; Zool. Blossom, 1839, 29. — 
Baird, B. N. Am. 1858, 702; Cat. N. Am. B. 1859, no. 516. — Ridgw. Norn. N. Am. B. 1881, 
no. 510 (melanocephala) . 
Strepsilas interpres, var. melanocephalus, Coites, Key, 1872, 247 ; Check List. 1873, no. 406®. 
Strepsilas interpres melanocephalus, Coites, Check List, 2d ed. 1882, no. 599. 
Hab. Pacific coast of North America, south to Monterey, California, north to the Aleutian 
Islands; accidental in India. 
Sp. Char. Head, neck, breast, and upper parts in general, fuliginous dusky, with a faint 
