Point Lepreaux N.B. [Point Lepreau, New Brunswick]
1876.
Tuesday
April 15 [April 15, 1876] Clear and calm. Went out in the boat
immediately after breakfast with Stone [William Stone] and
spent the forenoon. Birds commenced
flying at sunrise and continued
steadily passing until 1 P.M. when
they ceased altogether but later in
the afternoon a few more large flocks
went by. [delete]We had[/delete] Coots as usual
predominated and the flocks are
now almost exclusively O. perspicillata [Oidemia perspicillata]
with a good sprinkling of O. fusca [Oidemia fusca]
The latter much loss often flock with
the butter bills than the O. perspicillata [Oidemia perspicillata]
and almost always fly alone. O. [Am Oidemia americana]
is evidently the first to migrate, O.
perspicillata next and O. fusca
closes the migration. The numbers
of the coots that passed this morning
though, almost incredible were
well nigh equalled by the brants
which passed in perfect multitudes.
Of the latter hundreds of flocks were
seen and these were rarely composed
of less than 100 individual. Their
notes which I heard often are a
confused and rather feeble gabble
not nearly as musical as the honk
of B. Canadensis [Branta canadensis]. Their flight is
usually about 15 ft above the
water and they are generally crowded
together in clusters. Their flapping
is almost precisely like that of
the wild goose. Several large flocks
of S. mollissima [Somateria mollissima] passed and one
gave us a long shot but we failed