BARTRAMIAN SANDPIPER. 
165 
well as westward on either side of the Mississippi. Scattering 
broods and nests made in dry meadows are not uncommon a 
few miles from Salem, where Mr. N. West informs me he saw 
the young just fledged during the present season (1833) in 
the month of July. 
While here they feed much upon grasshoppers, which now 
abound in every field, and become so plump as to weigh up- 
wards of three quarters of a pound. They keep together usu- 
ally in broods or small companies, not in gregarious swarms 
like the Sandpipers, and when approached are, like Plovers, 
silent, shy, and watchful, so that it requires some address to 
approach them within gunshot. They run fast, the older 
birds sometimes dropping their wings and spreading the tail, 
as if attempting to decoy the spectator from paying attention 
to their brood. On alighting they stand erect, remain still, 
and on any alarm utter three or four sharp, querulous whistling 
notes as they mount to fly. In the pastures they familiarly 
follow or feed around the cattle, and can generally be best 
approached from a cart or wagon ; for though very wary of man, 
they have but little apprehension of danger in the company of 
domestic animals. In August the roving families now ap- 
proach the vicinity of the sea, resorting to feed and roost in 
the contiguous dry fields. In the morning as they fly high in 
the air in straggling lines, their short warbling whistle is some- 
times heard high overhead, while proceeding inland to feed, 
and the same note is renewed in the evening as they pass to 
their roosts. It is also very probable that this is usually the 
time they employ in their migrations to the South, which com- 
mence here early in September and by the middle of that 
month a few stragglers only are found. 
The Upland Plover is still abundant in New England during the 
migrations, and some breed here; but in the Maritime Provinces 
the bird is uncommon, and it has not been taken on the north side 
of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It is rarely met with in the region 
of the Great Lakes, but is very abundant on the Western plains. 
