194 KILDEER PLOVER.
the nest or young. The male dashes over you in the air, in the manner
of the European Lapwing, and vociferates all the remonstrances of
an angry parent whose family is endangered. If you cannot find pity
for the poor birds at such a time, you may take up their eggs and see their
distress; but if you be at all so tender-hearted as I would wish you to
be, it will be quite unnecessary for me to recommend mercy !
Few Plovers with which I am acquainted, acquire their full plumage
sooner than this species. Before December you can observe no difference
between the young birds and their parents; nay by this time, like most
other species, the former are as fully able to fly as at any other period.
While I was residing in Pennsylvania, the son of my tenant the miller
was in the habit of catching newly-hatched birds of every sort, to
bait his fish-hooks. I had rather peremptorily remonstrated against this
barbarous practice, although, I believe, without effect. One morning I
met him returning from the shores of the Perkioming Creek, with his hat
full of young Kildees. He endeavoured to avoid me, but I made directly
up to him, peeped into his hat and saw the birds. On this I begged
of him to go back and restore the poor things to their parents, which he
reluctantly did. Never had I felt more happy than I did when I saw
the young Plovers run off and hide under cover of the stones.
The Kildee seems to be remarkably attached to certain localities at
particular periods. Whilst at General HERNANDEZ'S in East Florida, I
accidentally wounded one near a barn on the plantation of my accomplished
host. Yet it returned to the same spot for the ten days that I remained
there, although it always flew off' when I approached it.
The food of this species consists of earth-worms, grass-hoppers,
crickets, and coleopterous insects, as well as small Crustacea, whether of
salt or fresh water, and snails. Now and then they may be seen thrusting
their bills into the mud about oysters, in search of some other food.
During autumn, they run about the old fields and catch an insect which
the Blue Bird has been watching with anxious care from the top of a
withering mullein stalk. They run briskly after the ploughman, to pick
up the worms that have been turned out of their burrows. Now standing
on the grassy meadow, after a shower, you see them patting the moist
ground, to force out its inhabitants. During winter, you meet with them
on elevated ground, or along the margins of the rivers; but wherever
you observe one about to pick up its food, you clearly see its body moving
in a see-saw manner on the joints of the legs, until the former being
K J L D E E R P L O V E R .
so placed that the bill can reach the ground, the object is seized, and the
usual horizontal position is resumed.
The flesh of the Kildee is generally indifferent, unless in early autumn,
when the young birds of that season are fat, juicy and tender. At all
seasons of the year, the Kildee is however shot by inexperienced sportsmen,
and many of these birds are offered for sale in our markets. Little
difference is observed at any period in the plumage of the adult birds.
CHARADRIUS VOCIFERUS, Linn. Syst. Nat. vol. i. p. 253—Lath. Ind. Ornith. vol. ii.
p. 742.—Ch. Bonaparte, Synops. of Birds of the United States p. 297-—Sivains.
and Richards. Fauna Bor. Amer. part ii. p. 368.
KILDEER PLOVER, CHARADRIUS VOCIFERUS, Wils. Amer. Ornith. vol. vii. p. 73.
pL 59. fig. 6—Nuttall, Manual, vol. ii. p. 22.
Adult Male in summer. Plate CCXXV. Fig. 1.
Bill shorter than the head, straight, somewhat cylindrical. Upper
mandible with the dorsal line straight for two-thirds of its length, then
bulging a little and curving to the tip, which is rather acute, the sides
flat and sloping at the base, convex towards the end, where the edges are
sharp and inclinate. Nasal groove extended along two-thirds of the
mandible, filled with a bare membrane ; nostrils basal, linear, in the lower
part of the membrane, open, and pervious. Lower mandible with the
angle long, narrow, but rounded, the sides at the base sloping outwards
and flat, the dorsal line ascending and slightly convex, the edges sharp
and involute towards the narrow tip.
Head of moderate size, oblong, rather compressed, the forehead
rounded. Eyes large. Neck rather short. Body ovate, rather slender.
Wings long. Feet long, slender; tibia bare a considerable way above
the joint; tarsus rather compressed, covered all round with reticulated
hexagonal scales; toes slender; the hind toe wanting; third or middle
toe longest, outer toe considerably longer than inner, all scutellate above
and marginate, the outer connected with the middle toe by a membrane
as far as the second joint; claws small, compressed, slender but obtuse at
the end, the inner edge of the middle claw slightly dilated.
Plumage soft and blended; the feathers rounded, those of the back
somewhat distinct. Wings long and pointed; primary quills tapering,
the first longest, the second a little shorter, the rest rapidly graduated ;
inner secondaries tapering and elongated, so as nearly to equal the longest
N2