Solitary Sandpiper

One June evening in 1894 I was broiling a chop over a fire on the edge of Sebago Lake, Maine.

The clear amber of those northern dusks suffused the western edge and merged in dark crystal of the near shore. A belated Swallow tipped the mirror into widening circles that soon faded. Peace — utter, complete — held this segment of the earth. Then a SOLITARY SANDPIPER pee-weeted past and on a short upward curve lit in spruce and settled, evidently for the night, in what I took for a bunch of lodged leaves. I did not disturb it and thereby lost the chance to discover this bird's home for when I learned years later, that they lay their eggs in deserted nests of other birds I was convinced of the lost opportunity.

This dainty oliveback whitebreast Sandpiper frequents the quiet pools of deep woodlands. I have never seen one on open beaches. In flight they are more given to turning than the Spotted Sandpipers and altho they "tilt up" like these birds, the motion is more deliberate and even the novice soon learns to distinguish them.