Female. Plate CCCIII. Fig. 2.
The female is a little larger, and weighs 7 oz., but resembles the male in colour. The individual of which the weight is here given was very fat, but I have never met with any that weighed three-fourths of a pound, as described by Wilson!
Length to end of tail 13 inches, to end of claws 14, extent of wings 22 3/4.
In an adult bird of this species, the tongue measures seven-twelfths of an inch in length, and is sagittate at the base, with conical papillæ, of which the outermost is much larger, then contracted, being deeper than broad, and tapering to a very acute compressed point. Aperture of the glottis 2/12 long, with numerous papillæ behind, the middle two largest. The œsophagus is 5 1/4 inches long, of uniform diameter, measuring about 3/12 across, and passing along the right side of the neck, along with the trachea. Proventriculus oblong, 8/12 in diameter, its glandules extremely numerous, oblong, half a twelfth in length. The stomach is a strong gizzard of an oblong form; an inch and a twelfth long, nine-twelfths in breadth, its lateral muscles of moderate thickness, the right 2 1/2/12, the left 5 1/2/12, the central tendons oblong, 5/12 in diameter. The cuticular lining is tough, of moderate thickness, longitudinally rugous, the grinding plates scarcely thicker than the rest. The intestine is 18 inches long, its diameter generally 3 1/2/12. The rectum 2 1/4 inches long; the cæca 2 2/12, very slender, their greatest diameter being only 1 1/2/12; the cloaca globular, about 1/2 inch in diameter. The stomach was filled with remains of grasshoppers, of a deep red colour, with which the inner coat was tinged, together with the head of a Libellula. No gravel or other hard substances.
The trachea moderately extended is 3 10/12 inches long, its transverse diameter 2 1/2/12, diminishing to 1 1/2/12. The rings are unossified and extremely thin, 105 in number; the contractor or lateral muscles feeble; the inferior larynx simple, with a single pair of tracheali-bronchiales, and the usual sterno-tracheales; the bronchi of about 15 half-rings.
This individual presented a very remarkable accumulation of fat over the abdominal and pectoral muscles, and especially about the furcula.
TURNSTONE.
Strepsilas Interpres, Illiger.
PLATE CCCIV. Adult in Summer and Winter.
This bird, which, in its full vernal dress, is one of the most beautiful of its family, is found along the southern coasts of the United States during winter, from North Carolina to the mouth of the Sabine River, in considerable numbers, although perhaps as many travel at that season into Texas and Mexico, where I observed it on its journey eastward, from the beginning of April to the end of May 1837. I procured many specimens in the course of my rambles along the shores of the Florida Keys, and in the neighbourhood of St Augustine, and have met with it in May and June, as well as in September and October, in almost every part of our maritime shores, from Maine to Maryland. On the coast of Labrador I looked for it in vain, although Dr Richardson mentions their arrival at their breeding quarters on the shores of Hudson’s Bay and the Arctic Sea up to the seventy-fifth parallel.
In spring the Turnstone is rarely met with in flocks exceeding five or six individuals, but often associates with other species, such as the Knot, the Red-backed Sandpiper, and the Tringa subarquata. Towards the end of autumn, however, they collect into large flocks, and so continue during the winter. I have never seen it on the margins of rivers or lakes, but always on the shores of the sea, although it prefers those of the extensive inlets so numerous on our coasts. At times it rambles to considerable distances from the beach, for I have found it on rocky islands thirty miles from the mainland; and on two occasions, whilst crossing the Atlantic, I saw several flocks near the Great Banks flying swiftly, and rather close to the water around the ships, after which they shot off toward the south-west, and in a few minutes were out of sight. It seems to be a hardy bird, for some of them remain in our Eastern Districts until severe frost prevails. Having seen some, in the beginning of June, and in superb plumage, on the high grounds of the Island of Grand Mannan, in the Bay of Fundy, I supposed that they bred there, although none of my party succeeded in discovering their nests. Indeed the young, as I have been informed, are obtained there, and along the coast of Maine, in the latter part of July.