PRzECOCIAL GRALLATORES — LIMICOLAb 
OQO 
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raised in that immediate vicinity ; and it was a particularly noticeable fact that 
there were few or no old birds to be seen. In one flock of two hundred or more 
he observed only a single old bird. He conjectured at the time that the parents 
might be engaged in raising a second brood ; but none were seen at any later period 
in that season. Mr. Kumlien has met with this species every year for more than 
thirty years. His attention was first called to it by the peculiar manner in which it 
carries its neck, which bulges out and presents a singular appearance, during the 
breeding-season, or about the last of May. At this time the birds were fighting, run- 
ning against one another, and uttering their peculiar grunting notes. They arrive 
in Wisconsin from the 4th to the middle of May, and leave early in the fall, none 
having been noticed after the first frost. Those that come to the lake in spring do 
not all stay. They do not arrive in flocks, like the Tringce, but are more scattered, 
and select by preference certain places in which they remain. He has never met 
with them at any great distance from the lake, and has every evidence, except actually 
finding their nests, that they breed in the marshes not far from it. It is not shy. 
Before pairing, this bird keeps in small companies, associating with small Tringce, 
Kildeer, etc. He has never noticed it swimming, except when wounded, and then it 
swims like a Duck, nodding its head the while. He has never known it to dive, but 
it often wades up to its belly in the shallow water. Its note — particularly during 
the breeding-season — is a singular low grunting, which is not easily described. In 
flying it lifts its wings higher than the Spotted Sandpiper and some of the small 
Tringce. In the spring of 1873 it was not more numerous than usual, but from the 
last of June to the last of August it was in unusual numbers, nearly all of them 
young. 
Mr. George 0. Welch, of Lynn, Mass., informs me that he has occasionally met 
with single birds of this species, but regards this as something very unusual. In 
May, 1874, he procured a fine specimen — a male — in Naliant. It was in its full 
summer dress, and his attention was called to it by its very singular proceedings. 
The bird was on the ground at the edge of a small brackish pool, every now and 
then springing up into the air, and — as was afterward ascertained — catching small 
dipterous insects. This it did as dexterously and as rapidly as the most expert 
Fly-catcher. Mr. Batty writes me that it is seen on Long Island occasionally, but 
that it is very rare there, as well as in Northern New Jersey, where it is called the 
“Needle-bill Snipe.” 
Mr. Audubon, in his account of this species, claims to have met with it along the 
whole eastern coast from Boston to New Jersey; but this probably was a mistake. 
It is certainly quite a rare bird in that region. Mr. Audubon also states that he saw 
it in Kentucky, as well as in other parts of the United States. In June, 4829, he 
received a pair which had just been killed by the fishermen with whom he was stay- 
ing. These had acted as if nesting, and their appearance seemed also to indicate 
this ; but their nest could not be found. About the same period his son procured two 
specimens killed on the rocks at the Rapids of the Ohio below Louisville. Late in 
the summer of 1824 three were obtained near Buffalo Creek on Lake Erie ; Edward 
Harris also procured one near New York, and John Bethune one near Boston. The 
birds obtained near Lake Erie were feeding around the borders and in the shallows 
of a pond of small extent. When first seen they were mistaken for Yellowshanks, 
so much did their movements resemble those of that species. They waded in the 
water up to their bodies, picking for food right and left, and performing all their 
movements with vivacity and elegance. They kept closely together, and occasion- 
ally raised their wings for a few moments, as if apprehensive of getting into too 
