Birds and Birding's Guide to:

Watching THE MIGRATIONS OF BIRDS

Longest Migration of Birds

The Plovers, Sandpipers, and kindred species take migratory journeys often of extraordinary length. Thus the American Golden Plover {Charadrius domini-cus) breeds in Arctic America, some venturing a thousand miles north of the Arctic Circle, and migrates through the entire length of North and South America ; to its winter home in Patagonia, and curiously the spring and fall routes are very different.

After feasting on the crowberry in Labrador they seek the coast of Nova Scotia, where they strike straight out to sea, taking a direct course for the easternmost islands of the W'est Indies, and thence to the northeastern coast of South America. In spring not one returns by this route, but in March they appear in Guatemala and Texas.”April finds their long lines trailing across the prairies of the Mississippi Valley; the first of May sees them crossing our northern boundary, and by the first week in June they reappear in their breeding grounds in the frozen North.

”The little Sanderling just mentioned is almost cosmopolitan in distribution, breeding in Arctic and sub-Arctic regions and migrating in the New World to Chile and Patagonia, a distance of 8000 miles, and in the Old World along all the shores of Europe, Asia, and Africa. The Bartramian Sandpiper (Bartramia longicauda) nests from eastern North America to Nova Scotia and Alaska, and goes south in winter to southern South America.

The Solitary Sandpiper (Totanus solitarius) breeds mainly to the north of the United States and winters as far south as Brazil and Peru. The Buff-breasted Sandpiper (Tryngites subnificollis) rears its young in the Yukon district of Alaska and from the interior of British Columbia to the Arctic coast, and journeys in winter well into South America.

The Turnstone (Arenaria interpres), a little shore-bird about the size of the Song Thrush of Europe, is also cosmopolitan, breeding in high northern latitudes and at other times of the year being found along the coast of Europe, Asia, Africa, North America, South America to the Straits of Magellan, Australia, and the Atlantic and Pacific islands. It is one of the species mentioned as making the wonderful flight from islands in the Bering Sea to the Hawaiian Islands.

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