October, 1918 
FOREST AND 
STREAM 
597 
NOTES ON SHORE BIRDS 
By J. T. N. 
when the crow flew in the open door, ate 
one pound all up, and was about to start 
on the second pad when my mother caught 
him in the act and slapped him and threw 
him out. He must have thought that “re¬ 
venge is sweet,” as in less than fifteen 
minutes thereafter we found him sitting 
out on the front porch where he had 
picked mother’s Easter lily down to the 
ground. He was cawing as though calling 
for her to come out and see what he had 
done. 
Billy likes to mimic. When the chickens 
cackle he cackles too, and succeeds so well 
that it is rather hard to tell which is the 
crow and which the chicken. He is quite 
an acrobat also. He hangs on the clothes 
line with his feet, lets his body drop, and 
swings in that position sometimes half an 
hour at a time. 
B ILLY is an early bird and calls for his 
breakfast at 4:30 A. M. We have 
nailed a board to the fence post and 
this is his table. If we forget to put his 
breakfast out the night previous, we suffer 
next morning until we get up and get him 
something to eat. 
He came to the house the other day and 
called and made such a fuss that my sister 
thought something must be wrong, so she 
went out into the yard; he flew toward 
the woods where he has his nest and she 
followed after. There under the tree in 
which he had built his nest lay one of his 
little ones. My sister picked him up and 
brought him home. We are now raising 
him as we did Billy. Billy is perfectly 
content since he knows that we have the 
little one. He comes to the house and 
calls on him and evidently is trying to get 
the little fellow to come with him, but the 
baby crow runs for the house when his 
mother (or father, we know not which) 
comes. 
The first year we had Billy he went away 
in the fall with the other crows, but the 
second year he stayed with us all winter. 
Somebody had caught him and painted 
his wings with white-lead, and it wasn’t 
possible for him to go away with his pals 
on that account. Every year since that 
time, however, he has gone away with the 
other crows. He generally goes about the 
middle of November, and for three years 
in succession came back home on St. Pat¬ 
rick’s day. He always comes in March. 
Some people think that it is a different 
crow each year, saying it would be im¬ 
possible for the same crow to return each 
year and find the house; but we know it 
is our same old crow, for one day when 
my sister was washing he ran in under 
her feet as she was leaving the house with 
the wash-tub in her hands and she didn’t 
see him. By stepping on his foot she crip¬ 
pled it, and it is still in that same crippled 
position. Making a guess at his age my 
mother says he is twenty years old or 
thereabouts! She is uncertain about his 
exact age. 
I have several pictures of this crow but 
cannot at the present time locate them. 
I will look for them again, and if I find 
them send same to you. If not, I will 
take some more pictures of him and send 
you some of them. He is not as tame now 
as he was the first couple of years we 
IV. —The Do witcher 
N its very long bill, comparatively short 
legs, and dark colors when in our lati¬ 
tude, the Dowitcher resembles the Wil¬ 
son’s Snipe, though its true affinities lie 
rather with the more littoral species of 
Limicolcc such as the two species of Yel- 
lowlegs. In migrating along the coastal 
marshes in late summer, it has much the 
same habits as the latter birds, occurring 
singly or in flocks of varying size, and 
coming readily to decoys set out by gun¬ 
ners. It frequently occurs in flocks of 
the Lesser Yellowleg, and on the wing 
may readily be confused with that bird. 
The whistled flight notes of several of 
these larger shore-birds are, moreover, 
very similar, but each is diagnostic to the 
trained ear. That of the Dowitcher is 
somewhat varied and hurried, frequently 
two or three-syllabled, suggesting the 
words “dowitch” or “dowitcher.” 
had him. That is, he will not now come 
into the house, but he comes to the door 
and flies around the yard, eating with the 
chickens when he gets real hungry. 
Our cat likes to loaf, and whenever 
Billy sees him running from the house, he 
chases him home and picks him almost to 
pieces until the cat finally is happy to come 
back. 
I could tell you numerous other little 
cute tricks Billy does, as he is always into 
something. We hope to get as much pleas¬ 
ure out of the little crow’s company as 
we do out of Billy’s, and hope to be able 
to raise him all right. 
It is said by ornithologists that crows, 
in regard to the relative size and weight of 
the brain as compared with the body, take 
The Dowitcher’s most characteristic 
flight mark is a long white diamond in the 
center of its dark back. This mark is con¬ 
cealed by the feathers when the bird 
alights, or in the dead bird, and is almost 
impossible to find in a stuffed skin. Adults 
in summer have the underparts more or 
less red; young on the southward migra¬ 
tion have the same buffy, and also have a 
characteristic grayish posterior border to 
the wing. The winter plumage is sand- 
gray like that of the Yellowlegs and others. 
Perhaps from its gentleness and its 
habit of bunching over decoys, this is one 
of the shore birds whose numbers have 
been greatly depleted. A western race of 
the Dowitcher, with an even longer bill 
than our bird of the eastern marshes, mi¬ 
grates along the Pacific coast. It is some¬ 
times found in the East, but this occur¬ 
rence is rare. The dowitcher is a delicious 
table morsel and ornithologically a snipe. 
a high and exceptional position. I can 
vouch for the high and exceptional intel¬ 
ligence of Billy, whose tricks and mischief 
have kept the whole family interested and 
amused, and oftentimes provoked, for a 
period extending over twenty years. If 
the little crow has inherited his parent’s 
cleverness, we look forward to a great 
deal of amusement from him. 
Although the crow is extremely intelli¬ 
gent and does some good in extirpating the 
larvae of destructive insects and field mice, 
they also destroy the eggs and young of 
valuable insectiverous and game birds. 
If at any time you desire any more in¬ 
formation concerning my crow, just drop 
me a line in care of Forest and Stream, 
and your letter will be answered promptly. 
Dowitcher and Oxeye. Photographed by J. T. Nichols at Mastic, Long Island 
