The Semipalmated Plover 
“IN CALIFORNIA the Semipalmated Plover is most common along 
the shores of the ocean and larger bays. It seems to be equally at home 
on sandy beaches and on the mud Hats of estuaries. L T nless too greatly 
harassed the birds are exceedingly tame and will allow one to approach 
very closely. They may be found singly, in pairs, in small groups of five 
or ten, or in flocks of forty to fifty; the companies may either consist 
entirely of their own kind, or include other small shore birds. When a 
flock alights on the feeding ground, the individuals comprising it scatter 
out at considerable distances from one another and thenceforth act with 
perfect independence. Each runs for a short distance with such rapid 
foot-movement and even carriage of the body that it seems to fairly 
glide over the surface of the sand; then it stops abruptly to dab slantingly 
into the wet sand for morsels of tood. Ground worked over in this 
manner shows a multitude of bill-marks. The movements of the birds 
are, as compared with those of sandpipers, more deliberate; now and then 
an individual momentarily dips its foreparts, a mannerism shared among 
several of the plovers. Ordinarily when the birds are scattered out over 
a feeding ground they are oblivious to one another’s presence; but, 
should danger threaten, the signal of one sets all on guard. As they 
take wing the members of a flock bunch quickly together and fly off 
rapidly, in close formation, with numerous utterances of their clear 
two-syllabled call-note. The Semipalmated Plover differs from the 
Killdeer in being much quieter, more gregarious, and in showing a decided 
preference for maritime forage grounds.” 1 
In strange contrast with the flock impulse referred to above, and 
which so generally affects wading birds, is the madness of certain individ¬ 
uals who become possessed of crank notions, and go tearing off into space 
1 Game Birds of Calif.. Grinnell, Bryant & Storer, p. 471. 
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