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Long-billed Curlew — Part 2
Images coming soon.
The Eskimo Curlew, Fute, Doe or Dough Bird, Short-billed or Little Curlew (Numenius borealis); about thirteen inches long, its short, decurved bill measuring less than two and a half inches, has blackish brown upper parts spotted with buff; the crown streaked, but without the distinct central line that marks the head of the Jack curlew; the under parts buffy or whitish, the breast streaked; the sides and under wing coverts barred with black. En route from the Arctic regions, where it nests, to Patagonia, where it winters, this is a very common species at times. The prairie lands adjacent to the Mississippi, its favorite highway, hold "immense flocks" in August and later, it is said; but very few stragglers reach the Atlantic shores. Just as the Jack curlew scrapes acquaintance with the willet, godwit, and other sandpipers on our beaches, so this curlew associates with the upland "plover," the golden plover, and other birds of the interior in this country and on the pampas covered plains of the Argentine Republic. In the Barren Grounds and across the continent from Greenland to Behring Straits, the Eskimo curlew nests. Its whistle is less harsh and loud than its long-billed cousin's, but in their habits generally these three curlews are alike.
PLOVERS
(Family Charadriidoe)