Along the rocky and stony portions of the Pacific coast, and especially on the islands and outlying reefs, this ocean wanderer is a common and well-known bird. Here it is much at home among the surf-swept rocks, drenched in ocean spray and often enveloped in fog; it has no fear of foaming breakers, which it nimbly dodges as it seeks its bits of marine food among the kelp and barnacles on the rocks. It is, at most seasons, essentially a bird of the seashore, but is seldom seen on the sandy or muddy shores. The dark color of its upper plumage matches its surroundings and it is not easily seen among the gloomy rocks, unless its characteristic outline can be seen against the sky or water as it poses on the top of some prominent rock to watch the intruder. If he approach too near, it flies off a short distance with loud, piercing cries and alights on another rock, to bob and teeter, somewhat like our familiar spotted and solitary sandpipers. It is generally solitary and seems to be satisfied with its own society.

It is well named, as it is a famous wanderer. I am tempted to quote Dr. E. W. Nelson’s (1887) well-chosen words on this subject, as follows:

Over the entire coast of the Pacific north of the equator its presence has been noted by the various naturalists whose Bohemian tastes have made their lives somewhat akin to that of this gentle wanderer. Across the broad ocean it ranges to those bits of paradise dotting the South Seas, tripping its way daintily on the beaches of the coral-enclosed islands, their feet laved by the warm waters of the tropics, and their eyes familiar with the luxuriant face of nature in its gentlest and most lovely state. The next season may find them thousands of miles to the north, under the shadow of the stupendous cliffs and grand but desolate and repellent scenes of the Aleutian Islands.

Spring.—Prof. Wells W. Cooke (1912) says that “the spring migration begins in March, bringing the birds to the coast of California by the latter part of the month. The Aleutian Islands are reached the middle of May, and the most northern part of the range by the latter part of the month.” H. W. Henshaw (1902) says that “about April or May the greater number” leave the Hawaiian Islands for the north. “While most go, many remain, the latter being the immature birds and the weaklings. At all events, those that remain retain the immature or winter dress and show not the slightest inclination to breed.” Henry Seebohm (1890) reports a straggler taken on the Bonin Islands on May 11, 1889. D. E. Brown’s notes record one at Forrester Island, Alaska, on May 3, 1917, and several at Grays Harbor, Wash., from May 4 to 21, 1920. He says: “At low tide these birds were found, with flocks of black turnstone, on the rock jetty and at high tide among the drift logs on the upper beach.”

Nesting.—The nesting habits of the wandering tattler long remained shrouded in mystery. Various observers had seen it on or near its probable breeding grounds in the interior of different parts of Alaska. Dr. Wilfred H. Osgood (1907) collected a very young bird in which “the head and neck were still downy,” near the upper MacMillan River, Yukon, on September 5, 1904, and he reported a pair, which evidently had young, seen by Charles Sheldon, near Mount McKinley, July 28, 1906. Dr. Joseph Grinnell (1910) mentions a “half-grown juvenal” taken by Joseph Dixon on Montague Island, July 28, 1908.

The first nest was found in 1912 and is thus described in a letter from J. M. Jessup to Dr. Charles W. Richmond, accompanied by a specimen of the bird:

The wandering tattler was found nesting on a gravel bar near a small stream flowing into the Arctic Ocean, the exact location was about latitude 69° 10´ and longitude 141° west, or about 25 miles south of the Arctic Ocean near the international boundary between Canada and Alaska. The nest was first observed by Sir Frederick Lambart of the Canadian Coast and Geodetic Survey, and was later identified by myself. Sir Frederick describes the nest as follows: “The nest was situated in the middle of an elevated gravel bar open to the sky for fully 50 feet all around. The nest was just alongside a small rock; there were no sticks or any form of nest material, it consisted merely of a semispherical hollow in dry fine and coarse gravel. Four eggs were in the nest, I should say about the size of a ptarmigan’s, brownish blue and mottled very much like a sandpiper’s. The young birds were noted to have come out of the eggs July 9.”

Ten years later Olaus J. Murie (1924) collected a downy, young wandering tattler on Jennie Creek, a small tributary of Savage River, in the Alaska Range, on June 9, 1922. The following year he completed the record by finding a nest and collecting the first and only set of eggs ever taken. He has given us a very good account of the whole proceeding, from which I quote, as follows:

The following day, July 1, we continued up Savage River 9 miles and made permanent camp. We had been on the lookout for the birds and I had pointed out to Mr. Buhmann one in the distance, that he might have an idea for what we were looking. About noon Mr. Buhmann and my brother were riding on the wagon, while I walked ahead over the usual gravel bars, when Mr. Buhmann suddenly called out to me, “Is that one of your birds?” I turned and saw a wandering tattler flying away. The bird had been flushed by the horses. We all three walked back carefully beside the wagon and in a few moments spied the nest and eggs a short distance to the rear, not over 6 inches from the wheel track! Mr. Buhmann picked up one of the eggs, wishing, as he enthusiastically explained, to be the first one who had ever handled the egg of a wandering tattler. I explained that the eggs should not be disturbed until photographed, and it was carefully replaced in the nest. A series of exposures was made of the nest and eggs, and we moved away some distance with our outfit and prepared our lunch. In the meantime the bird returned and settled on the nest. Several photographs were then taken of the bird on the eggs, the last one at a distance of about 10 feet or less. The nest and eggs were then taken and carried to our camping ground.

All our observations indicate that this nesting site is characteristic, that the wandering tattler prefers the gravel bars of mountain streams, as typified by Savage River. These rivers are rapid and split into numerous channels, sometimes in an intricate network over the gravelly valley. This nest was found on Savage River about 5 miles above the mouth of Jennie Creek at an elevation of about 4,000 feet. It was placed on a gravel bar about 30 feet from the nearest water, and was sunk in a shallow depression in the gravel. It was well built, unusually elaborate for a shore bird. It was composed principally of fine roots carefully woven into a firm structure, including a number of twigs around the edges. Small bits of twigs and some dry leaves had been used for lining. It was so compact that I had no difficulty in picking it up and transporting it to camp. The diameter of the nest to the edges of the finely woven body was about 5 inches, but, of course, some of the twigs extended much farther.

Eggs.—The eggs taken by Mr. Murie on Savage River, Alaska, July 1, 1923, are now in the United States National Museum and are, so far as I know, the only eggs in existence. In shape they are between pyriform and subpyriform, and they have a slight gloss. The ground color is between “glaucous” and “greenish glaucous,” as in some crow’s eggs. They are spotted and blotched irregularly, rather heavily near the larger end and rather sparsely elsewhere, with dark browns, from “seal brown” or “bone brown” to “burnt umber” or “Verona brown”; there are some elongated splashes and some small, inconspicuous, underlying spot of various shades of “brownish drab.” They measure 43.3 by 32.7, 44.5 by 31.4, 44.1 by 31.5, and 43.7 by 32.3 millimeters.

Young.—The young are able to run about soon after they are hatched and are carefully guarded by both parents. An adult, secured by Mr. Murie with the downy young, proved to be a male. “A whistled cheep, imitating a chick, would bring the excited bird within a few feet.” Mr. Jessup writes that the mother bird was much distressed and attempted to lure him from her little one by feigning lameness.

Plumages.—Mr. Murie (1924) has described the downy young very well, as follows:

These downy young may be described as follows: Under parts dull white with a faint indication of grayish on upper breast and lower fore neck; upper parts pale gray, with a very slight suggestion of buffy on wings, rump, and tail, more evident in the fresh specimens than in the skin; upper parts narrowly, irregularly, and indistinctly barred with blackish, with dull black loral and postocular streaks and with irregular black spots on hind pileum. In a colored sketch made from freshly killed bird, tarsus and upper part of toes appear dull glaucous green; the under surface of foot olive yellow; bill dull glaucous blue.

Another bird which I have examined, as a dried skin, does not show any buffy tints. A young bird, mainly in juvenal plumage but still downy on the hind neck, chin and forehead, taken on September 5, is from “deep mouse gray” to “dark olive gray” above, with very faint whitish tips; the wing coverts have more prominent white edgings; the chest is “pallid mouse gray,” and the flanks “pale mouse gray,” both more or less indistinctly barred; the rest of the under parts are white. A limited postjuvenal molt of the body plumage occurs in September, producing the first winter plumage; this is much like the adult, except that the juvenal wing coverts, some of the scapulars and the mottled plumage of the breast and flanks are retained. Some young birds apparently assume a plumage which is practically adult at the first prenuptial molt in April.

Adults have a complete postnuptial molt from August to January, the wings being molted last, between October and January. I have seen birds in full nuptial plumage from April 13 to September 14 and in full winter plumage as late as April 12. In winter adults the upper parts are slightly lighter gray than in summer, the sides of the head, chest and flanks are still lighter gray and the chin and belly are white. The partial prenuptial molt occurs in April.

Food.—The usual feeding grounds of the wandering tattler are the rocky shores, where it searches for its food among the kelp-covered rocks at the water’s edge, following the receding waves and nimbly dodging the incoming breakers or making short flights to avoid the surf. If over-taken and drenched it flies to a rock, shakes the water from its plumage and soon resumes its feeding. B. J. Bretherton (1896) says that on Kodiak Island:

This species seemed to habitually frequent the sand or gravel beaches in preference to rocky localities, and had regular feeding grounds to which they resorted at certain stages of the tide, returning regularly each day at the same time. Their food consists largely of decapods together with small crabs, marine worms, and minute mollusks.

Its food seems to be mainly insects, but includes small crustaceans, minute mollusks, marine worms, and other small marine animals. The contents of six stomachs, reported on by Preble and McAtee (1923) consisted of “flies (Diptera), 46.1 per cent; caddis flies 30.6 per cent; amphipods, 16 per cent; mollusks, 3.6 per cent; and beetles 1.1 per cent.”

Behavior.—The movements of wandering tattlers are often suggestive of spotted sandpipers with which they are sometimes associated; they indulge in the same “tip-up” motion of the body, though less frequently; and their flight is very similar, with intermittent strokes of down-curved wings. W. Leon Dawson (1923) says:

When it alights, it sits for some time motionless in a plover like attitude, with its long bill held horizontally, invisible, in the dull light of a foggy day, unless, perchance, outlined against the surf. At other times the bird will betray its uneasiness by a jetting motion of the tail.

In his notes on the Farallones, Mr. Dawson (1911) says:

Contrary to earlier statements these tattlers do spend a considerable portion of their time upon the higher ground. The tiny bowlder-strewn meadow surrounding my earlier camp (just east of Franconia Beach) was a favorite resting place for them, and I am inclined to think the birds spent the night there, for some were invariably startled upon my first appearance mornings. Having a common affection for the tide reefs, wandering tattlers are not infrequently found in loose association with black turnstones; but when put to flight they pay no attention whatever to the fortunes of their chance shipmates nor to others of their own kind.

Dr. E. W. Nelson (1883) writes:

Their note is a loud, ringing whistle, which seems specially fitted to the bird and the haunts it occupies, and as the shrill cry reechoes from the towering cliffs and ledges at the base of which it feeds its peculiar character and intonation might lead one to fancy some genie of the rocks was uttering its cry. When the birds are approached by boat as they are feeding along the water’s edge they ascend gradually, with an expression of mild curiosity, and pass from ledge to ledge until they reach a jutting point on the face of the cliff or its brow, where they stand in relief, like beautiful clear-cut statuettes, and do not utter a sound or move until they are still further alarmed, when they take flight, uttering at the same moment their loud note before mentioned.

Voice.—Doctor Nelson (1880) describes its note as “a loud, ringing kla, kla, kla,” and again he (1887) calls it “a loud, clear, flutelike tu, tu, tu, tu.” Mr. Dawson (1923) says it is “a quavering cry, somewhat like the tew, tew, tew of the greater yellowlegs, but more subdued.” Mr. Murie (1924) writes:

Whenever I approached the home grounds of a wandering tattler he would fly to meet me and would scold excitedly, uttering a vigorous deedle-deedle-deedle-deedle-dee, with variations which I failed to record minutely.

Fall.—Doctor Nelson (1887) says:

They usually reappear on the seacoast about St. Michaels the last of July or very early in August and remain until from the 1st to 10th of September. During their presence on the coast of Norton Sound they show a decided preference for the most rugged and rock-bound parts of the shore, rarely or never occurring elsewhere. It is a frequent and regular summer bird on the rocky parts of the coast to the vicinity of Bering Straits and occurs on the islands and Siberian shore of Bering Sea.

William Palmer (1899) says that on the Pribilof Islands:

It is the first species to return in the fall; adult birds, July 10 and afterwards. Usually in pairs on the surf-swept rocks, but sometimes seen—usually the brownish, unbarred, and less wary immature—on open sandy places, and sometimes with the turnstones on a sandy beach. They are not shy, but are seldom noticed when perched on the wet rocks, which harmonize so well with their color. Solitary birds remain quiet and unseen and will permit one to approach quite close, frequently startling us as they get up suddenly, almost under our very feet, and uttering their loud, shrill cry, flying off to another resting place.

From the Aleutian Islands and the interior of Alaska there is a southward migration to the islands in the Pacific, where it spends the winter, and a more general movement southward along the Pacific coast of North America. D. E. Brown’s notes record it on the coast of Washington from August 10 to September 15. It has been recorded in California early in July, but these were perhaps summer sojourners; the return movement seems to come along between July 15 and August. H. W. Henshaw (1902) says that the return migrants begin to appear in the Hawaiian Islands “about the middle or latter part of August”; he noticed that “the first comers are adults, chiefly males, and still in nuptial dress.”

Winter.—The Santa Barbara Islands, off the coast of southern California, mark the northern limit of the normal winter range of the wandering tattler, where a few may always be found in winter. Most of the birds go farther south. W. B. Alexander tells me that the wandering tattler occasionally visits Cape York, North Queensland, and there is a specimen, unquestionably of this species, in the Museum of Comparative Zoölogy in Cambridge, from Australia.

DISTRIBUTION

Range.—Western North and South America, eastern Asia, and Oceanica.

Breeding range.—The nest and eggs of the wandering tattler have actually been found only on one occasion (Savage River, Alaska [Murie]); but the evidence of young birds seems sufficient to establish additional breeding stations in Alaska (Mount McKinley and probably Montague Island); and in Yukon (Russell Mountains). They probably breed also in eastern Siberia (Plover Bay). Nonbreeding specimens have been observed or collected in summer at many localities on the Pacific coast, south to Lower California (Socorro Island, San Jose Island, and Cocos Island); and the Hawaiian Islands (Cocoanut Island).

Winter range.—The winter range of the wandering tattler extends north to the Philippine Islands (Mindanao); the Hawaiian Islands (Laysan, Kauai, and Hawaii); and probably, rarely, Oregon (Cannon Beach). East to probably, rarely Oregon (Cannon Beach); California (Santa Cruz Island, and Santa Monica); Lower California (Cedros Island, Comondu, and San Jose Island); and the Galapagos Islands (Abingdon, Indefatigable, Chatham, and Hood). South to the Galapagos Island (Hood and Albemarle); Paumotu Islands; Society Islands (Huaheine); Samoa; Fiji Islands (Ovalau); New Hebrides (Aneiteum); and northeastern Australia (Cape York). West to northeastern Australia (Cape York); and the Philippine Islands (Mindanao).

Spring migration.—Early dates of spring arrival are: Washington, Shoalwater Bay, May 1; Alaska, Forrester Island, May 7, Cape Prince of Wales, May 11, Sanak Island, May 15, Unalaska Island, May 18, and Mount McKinley, May 18; and Siberia, Copper Island, May 17.

Late dates of spring departure are: Guerrero, Acapulco, April 30; Lower California, Cedros Island, April 24, Socorro Island, May 10, Guadeloupe Island, May 18, and Clarion Island, May 20; California, San Nicholas Island, May 11, and Eureka, May 18; Washington, Neah Bay, May 20, and Flattery Rock, June 2; and British Columbia, Courtenay, May 23, and Comox, June 4.

Fall migration.—Early dates of arrival in the fall, are: British Columbia, Okanagan, July 26; Washington, Clallam Bay, July 16, and Quillayute Needles, July 17; Oregon, Seal Rocks, July 22, and Crater Lake, July 27; California, Farallon Islands, July 13, Monterey Bay, July 14, and Santa Cruz, August 1; and Lower California, Los Coronados Islands, August 6, and Cedros Island, August 14.

Late dates of fall departure are: Alaska, St. Paul Island, October 4, and Unalaska, October 16; British Columbia, Okanagan, September 20; and Washington, Seattle, September 18, and Clallam Bay, September 19.

Egg Dates.—Alaska: One record, July 1, 1925.