The Birds Of Shetland With Observations On Their Habits Migration And Occasional Appearance Edited By S H Saxby With Coloured Illustrations PDF Download

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1874 edition. Excerpt: ...one I have always experienced a considerable amount of difficulty in restoring the feathers of the back of the neck to their original position. THE COMMON SANDPIPER. Totanus hypoleucos. It was not until the year 1869 that I was able to procure for identification so much as a single specimen of this bird, when, on the 2d of July, Robert Mouat not only shot a pair at the Loch of Cliff, but had a chase after the young as they ran among the long grass. This is the only direct evidence of its breeding in Shetland; though that it does so regularly is pretty certain, for during the summer months the bird is often heard and sometimes seen. Messrs Baikie and Heddle consider it merely an occasional visitor to Orkney. Thomas Edmondston's singular mistake of recording this species as a winter visitor to Shetland was afterwards corrected by himself. Somewhat later in the above-named year, I myself shot one from a small party, perhaps a family. It fell, winged, into the water, and remained swimming leisurely about while I pushed off the boat and rowed up; but the bird dived the moment I attempted to seize it, and although I kept a strict look-out all round upon the dead-calm surface of the water it never reappeared. Another singular fact in connection with the habits of this bird is its, at any rate occasional, terror at thunder. I remember as a boy, in the autumn of 1850, trying for several days to get near some Common Sandpipers which had appeared upon the rocky shore near Dunnose, in the Isle of Wight, but so wild were they that not even a long shot could be obtained. One afternoon while I was endeavouring to stalk them, a heavy thunderstorm came on, and during one remarkably heavy peal I observed the birds fluttering to the shelter of the rocks;...