20 October: 
Heavy rain squalls last night and again this morning* The ^olden Plover 
is back again eating ham and eggs which we put out for him* 
This morning I went down to the beach* Had painted hermit crabs ca* 1000 
feet from camp* dot 2 fish balls on North point of Island* 
In afternoon collected a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper* Bill dark gray, iris dark 
brown, gape violet, feet and legs greenish-yellow, £2 gins* I now don* t think 
the bird I collected on McKean was ^harp-tail; it was a Pectoral. Heavy fat; 
ovary granular* Sharp-tail# - Field Identification « J* Bill straight, not 
slightly arooped* Legs greenish. No white in tail. Chestnut cap* Whiter eye line 
than Pectoral, Streaking as in LeConte’s or Baird’s Sparrow* Very buffy appear¬ 
ance. They may possibly be immature birds (which I have described). 
21 October; 
Ship arrived off island this morning around 0230* Mr* Ashton (first mate) 
came in at 0630 with raft. At approximately 0700 we made an attempt to get 
off island which failed. The motor gave us all sorts of problems resulting in 
our almost turning over in the surf and myself along with one of the ship’s crew 
being thrown out and under the raft. Damned lucky it was a sandy bottom. Much 
of the gear in the raft was also thrown out (despite lashing beforehand) but all 
of it was retrieved. Finally at 0900 another raft from the ship came into the 
surfline and Dayle swam in with a line. We were then towed out through the 
surf without any misphaps. The ship was underway for Howland at 0935# 
Species accounts 
Bar-tailed ^odwait 
o 
(15-21 £ 43 ^ 4 .) 1 bird present which I collected on the 19th. Was feeding en¬ 
tirely on the shoreline and I saw it eat stranded minnows. 
Sooty Tern 
(15*21 Oct.) Heard a few (less than 5) over the island on 3 nights. There 
were also a few in feeding flocks well off shore. Sooties not recorded as breed¬ 
ing on Baker* 
Common Noddy 
(15-21 Oct.) A few birds flying around. None breeding. 
Hawaiian Noddy 
(15-21 Oct*) A few birds roosting (less than 20) on phone poles and NW beach| 
None breeding. 
