2 TURNSTONE.
has amused suspicion ; the young un first reaching our shores in autumn are utterly regardless of danger.
Turnstones occasionally suffer severely from the buffet bags of long-continued gales: several with puffedout
plumage were noticed moping round the pool* of rain-water on the drive at Yarmouth during the
storms in November 1*72; the poor birds, which were in company with a few Purple Sandpipers, appeared
to retain scarcely sufficient strength to avoid tho traffic along the road.
Though Turnstones must he constantly passing over the North Sea during spring and autumn, I
received information of hut a single bird (a female taken un board the 'Inner Dowsing' early in July
1S73) striking the light-ships during the seasons I was in correspondence with the vessels off the cast
coast.
The adults probably moult during August and the following month; an old male shot on the 281U
or August 1870 at Shorcham still retained a sufficient quantity of bright feathers on the head and hack
to indicate his age and sex, while the remainder of his plumage was mottled and much resembled that of
the immature birds, with which probably the dress of the adults corre-ponds in winter. The legs and
feet were also a dirty yellow, having completely lost the bright orange, though the strength of the limbs
and black claws also pointed to the age of the specimen.
SANDER L I N G.
CALimm ARKS ARIA.
Tur home of the Sauderliug in this country is, as its name would seem to indicate, along the sandy shores
of flic open sea; I caa find no entry in my notes referring to the fact that this bird has been met with
at any distance from salt water. 1 well remember, however, during the severe weather in December 1671,
when llickling ltroad was entirely laid with ice, with the exception of the wakes in the channel kept
open by (be keepers for the Swans and Coots, that a Sanderling, in company with a couple of Dunlins,
swept round the open water and finally settled on the ice. This species, according tu my own observation,
may be met with during every mouth in tho year on various parts of the shores of the British Islands.
So late as the 10th of June in 1889 a large tlock of these birds in the finest breidiug-plumage were seen
on the sands of the Dornoch Firth, half a mile or SO inside the bar; these or others were also observed
on two occasions during the following week near tho same spot. In July and August I have noticed
small parties of birds in apparently an intermediate stage of plumage; these might possibly have been
no11-breeders or those weakened by wounds or other causes, and not possessing sufficient strength to make u,
lengthened journey. The lust week in August or early in Septemlier is usually the date of arrival of
largo flocks of Immature birds on the flat- along the coasts of Kent and Sussex. Pur the tirst fortnight
in September lsflt) an immense BOOK of small YYaders, numbering al leant five or six hundred, frequented
at low water the wide stretches of sand on each side of the outlet of the river flowing through llye
Harbour Sandcrlings in the juvenile plumage formed about three fourths of the gathering, the remainder
being cumposed of immature Curlew Sandpipers and Kentish Plovers, about equally divided. If adults
of any of the three species were present 1 failed to detect them, though the whole IKKIV' were oxecc liugly
uiisiispii ions of danger Ix-fore the few I needed as specimens were obtained, and it is very unlikely tliat
they COuld have escaped notice.
The greater part of the month of October in 18119 was exceedingly fine on the north-east coast of
.Scotland, and during the second week both Wildfowl and the smaller Waders wen met with in swarms on
the Tain Sands of flic Dornoch Firth. The men working tny Isiats having requested that some of the
latter might be procured, I find one barrel of a double 10-1 tore into the first three flocks (one of
which proved to he composed entirely of this species, and the others of Dunlins) that Hew past the punt,
ond on the slain being collected they amounted to exactly one hundred and twenty birds, forty-two of
which were Sandcrlings, and the remainder Dunlins, thirty-eight and forty falling to the next two
charges, and the whole being secured, the shallow water into which they drnp|ieJ offering little chance
of escape for the wounded. On the 8th of October, 1888, wind south and fine, I remarked that both
immature and adults in nututnu plumage were pissing along the Sussex coast off Shorcham, flying
west in numberless Hocks for scleral hours during the day; Terns also of various species wen; following
the same course. In the pale grey and white dress of winter the Sauderliug is abundant BATWBBB