The Stints. 
■ °o 
THE 
BUFF-BREASTED 
SANDPIPER. 
( Tringites 
subnificollis.) 
THE 
SANDERLING. 
(Calidris arenaria.) 
American species, which has occurred in England and Ireland on several occasions 
in the autumn and winter. At this season of the year it wanders to South America, 
and has even been captured in Australia. 
With the present species commences the Sub-family 
Scolopacincc, or Snipes and Sandpipers. They are distinguished 
from the Totanincc by having the toes cleft to the base, with no 
web between them. In the genus Tringites the bill is short, 
measuring less than the length of the tarsus, and the centre 
tail-feathers are not produced beyond the others. The Buff- 
breasted Sandpiper is a North American bird, which has occurred about sixteen 
times in the British Islands. It is a very conspicuous species by reason of the 
mottling on the under side of the primary-quills. (See p. 182.) 
The Sanderling differs 
from all the other species of 
Sandpipers in the absence 
of the hind-toe. It is a very 
pretty bird, especially in summer, with the bright 
rufous colour of the upper parts, and its chestnut 
throat and breast ; but in autumn it looks 
much whiter than any of its allies, and 
only the Kentish Plover presents the same 
appearance on the shore. The Sanderling breeds 
in the Arctic Regions of Siberia and North 
America, but very few authentic eggs have as 
yet been taken. In autumn and winter it is a 
very common bird on all our coasts, and ranges to Africa, as well as India, Australia 
and South America. When noticed in England, it is either consorting with 
Dunlins and other Waders, or it goes in flocks consisting mostly of young birds of its 
own species. Colonel Feilden found the nest in Grinnell Land at a height of several 
hundred feet above the sea ; it was a depression in the centre of a recumbent plant 
of the Arctic Willow, and had a few dead leaves and catkins for its lining. The eggs 
are four in number, a little more than an inch-and-a-quarter in length, of a pale 
olive-brown, faintly mottled and spotted with brown and violet-grey. 
The Stints have a hind-toe and a very short bill, and they are 
all very elegant little birds, being remarkably tame in their 
arctic breeding-haunts, so much so that they scarcely move 
from their nest when it is being rilled, and Mr. Pearson tells of 
one that actually sat on his gun. The Little Stint belongs to the section of the 
genus which has the tail-feathers smoky-brown : it has blackish legs, and is dis- 
tinctly of a rufous shade both in old individuals and young birds of the year, while, 
in winter, the old birds are ashy above and white below. To Great Britain the Little 
Stint is a visitor during the spring and autumn migrations, but does not breed with 
The Sanderling. 
THE LITTLE 
STINT. 
(Limonites minuta.) 
