PECTORAL SANDPIPER. 09
They feed on small Crustacea, beetles, and other insects and larvae,
with which they swallow a few seeds: they also subsist on some species
of sea-weed, and absorb small fragments of stone. For the formernamed
they bore with the bill in the sand.
The note is a low plaintive whistle.
Male; length, eight inches to eight inches and three quarters, or a
little over that; bill, dark dusky brown towards the tip, orange brown
about the base; from it a dusky line extends to the eye, and over it
a white streak. Iris, dark brown; head on the sides, greyish white
tinged with brown, and streaked with dusky black along the shaft of
each feather; on the crown, dusky brown, the feathers with dark
central streaks and rufous tips; neck on the sides, greyish white with
a tinge of brown, and each feather streaked along the shaft with dusky
black; on the back and the nape, dark brown with lighter-coloured
margins to the feathers; chin, white; throat and breast above, greyish
white, the latter tinged with pale brown and yellowish, with a dusky
black streak along the shaft line of each feather; below white. Back,
dark blackish brown, with lighter-coloured margins to the feathers, in
ummer ferruginous or ochreous, in winter pale.
The wings expand to the width of one foot three inches and a
half; the first quill feather is the longest. Greater and lesser wing
coverts, dark brown, with lighter-coloured edges to the feathers;
primaries, dusky black, the shaft of the first white; secondaries, dusky
black, each with a narrow edge of white; tertiaries, dark brown, with
lighter-coloured margins, in summer ferruginous. The tail, much
graduated, has the two middle feathers, which are the longest, black
with pale brownish white margins, and in summer broadly edged with
ferruginous, the others grey brown or brownish black, tipped and
edged with yellowish white or yellowish brown, according to the season;
upper tail coverts, black, glossed with purple, the feathers edged and
tipped with ochreous, which becomes pale in winter; under tail coverts,
white. Legs and toes, yellowish olive green brown; claws, dusky black.