Part 62

Both sexes incubate, but when the eggs are fresh or partly incubated the hen seems to brood and the cock stands on guard. When the eggs were within a day or two of hatching or were just chipping we invariably found the cock incubating, and when the young were out we always found the cock looking after the family and the hen, with her duller plumage and weaker notes, on guard. These characteristics observed in the cases of 19 pairs should form a useful basis for further research.

On flushing the cock bird from four young in down on the Mouettes Islands I was shown an example of his tenacity and intelligence. I had taken the young birds away in my pocket and had run back to the boat across a neck of land some 300 yards broad. The cock chased me a little way and then disappeared. On reaching the sea, however, on the other side of the small peninsula, I immediately saw the cock fly around the point and make straight for me, and he stood and chattered at me until we rowed away in the boat. The hen put in no appearance at all.

Again, on one of the islands we watched a pair whose behavior puzzled us, but soon discovered that there were four young birds being looked after by the cock. The moment he was flushed the young birds scattered in all directions, and on our lying down again came back under the fatherly wing. Before I discovered that the cock incubated in the last stages I patiently watched a hen running about quite unconcernedly for almost an hour, and then suddenly jumped to the conclusion that the cock was sitting. When I got up the hen gave the alarm note and I flushed the cock from four chipping eggs.

A. L. V. Manniche (1910) writes:

The parents are very watchful against danger in the breeding time and when the young ones are small. One of them will keep a lookout from the summit of a large stone or a rock while the other is brooding or guiding the young ones. The bird on guard will discover an approaching enemy at an incredibly long distance and rush toward him uttering furious cries. Especially the skua (Lestris longicauda) is a detested enemy of the turnstone. Every day I could observe the hunting skuas pursued by turnstones. When one pursuer returned to its district another would appear and thus every skua was almost always accompanied by at least one turnstone. Also toward the polar fox the turnstones would betray great fear, and they would often join from afar and swoop down on the hated enemy, uttering their sharpest and most violent cries.

Toward the end of July the young ones were able to fly but were, however, generally accompanied by the old female. The young ones would often resort to the upper part of rather high rocks while the old female incessantly crying and anxiously flapping tried to divert my attention from them. When the old female had left her offspring and the country, these would immediately take to the coast and the mouths of rivers like other young waders.

Plumages.--The young turnstone in natal down is not brilliantly, yet distinctively, colored. The upper parts, including the sides of the head and neck, wings and thighs, vary from “cream buff” or “chamois” on the crown and wings to “olive buff” on the neck and flanks. The crown, back, wings, rump, and thighs are heavily spotted or broadly striped with black; the center of the crown is largely black and so are the lores; a broad space above the eyes and the forehead are “cream buff,” with a black streak in the middle of the latter. There is some whitish in the center of the back and the entire under parts are pure white.

In full juvenal plumage, Alaska birds in July, the crown and mantle are dark sepia or blackish brown, the feathers of the crown edged with sandy brown, those of the back broadly edged with “pinkish buff” or “cream buff” and the wing coverts still more broadly edged with “cinnamon buff”; the tertials are edged with “cinnamon”; the feathers of the rump, the tail coverts, and the tail are tipped with a buffy wash; the under parts are similar in pattern to those of the adult, but the black patches are browner and often show buffy tips. The sexes are practically alike in juvenal and winter plumages.

The first winter plumage is acquired by a partial body molt between August and November; it can be distinguished from the adult winter plumage by the presence of some retained tertials, scapulars, and wing coverts; also it is not so uniformly dark as the adult, is more streaked with buffy and whitish edgings on the head, neck, and back, and it has less black in the gorget. The two races are distinguishable in this plumage, interpres being darker.

The first prenuptial molt begins in January; it is similar to that of the adult but is much less complete. I have seen a young bird in full wing molt in January and think that young birds renew their flight feathers before the first spring. The first nuptial plumage is, I believe, a nonbreeding plumage, as it is worn by birds which spend the summer far south of the breeding range. I have seen birds in this plumage, collected in Florida and Louisiana, in every month from April to August. This plumage resembles the adult nuptial, but the head is more streaked with dusky or black; and in the mantle, scapulars and wing coverts there is a mixture of new rufous feathers and both old and new blackish brown feathers. The sexes are recognizable in this plumage, the males being much brighter. A complete molt in August produces the adult winter plumage.

Adults have a complete postnuptial molt, from July to October, but mainly in August, when the wings are molted. They have a partial prenuptial molt from February to June, mainly in March and April, involving the body plumage, but not all the scapulars or wing coverts.

Food.--The turnstone is mainly a maritime species and its favorite feeding grounds are the stony and sandy beaches along the seashore and the rocky promontories and islets on the coasts. But on its inland migrations it finds its food on the shores and beaches of the larger lakes and rivers. The turnstone derives its name from its well-known and conspicuous habit of turning over, with its short, stout bill and sturdy muscles, stones, shells, clods of earth, seaweed, and other objects in search for the dainty morsels of animal food that it finds beneath them. If the object is not too large the bird stoops down and overturns it with a quick jerk of the head and neck; but against a larger obstacle it places its breast and pushes with all its strength; it is surprising to see how large a stone or clod it can move. It also has a peculiar habit of rooting like a pig in piles of seaweed or in the open sand. Windrows of seaweed and other rubbish are generally full of sand fleas and various worms and insects and their larvae, where the turnstones and other waders find an abundant feast. Frank T. Noble (1904) has described this very well, as follows:

He would select a likely spot on the loosely packed moss and go at his work with a vim and rapidity entirely different from the other species. Underneath the bits of weed, moss, and fragments of shell his sharp upturned bill would swiftly go and a perfect shower of these would soon be falling in front and beside him. Finding a morsel to his taste he would devour it in much less time than it takes to relate it, and the rooting and tossing of the bits into the air would continue. At times quite sizeable fragments of shell and pieces of moss more than an inch in length would be thrown fully 7 or 8 inches above the bird’s head, and this he would keep up, with scarcely an instant’s pause, for a quarter of an hour and until he had excavated a pit large enough to almost conceal his plump, mottled body. Occasionally he would turn about in his tracks, but as a rule he worked in one direction.

I have seen a similar method employed on a sand flat laid bare at low tide, where four or five turnstones were feeding, accompanied by sanderlings and peeps. The turnstones were digging holes in the wet sand, throwing out the sand for a distance of several inches, until the holes were big enough to admit the whole of a man’s fist and deep enough to conceal the bird’s head and neck. Meantime the sanderlings were standing close by and picking up some small objects thrown out, until driven away by savage attacks of the turnstone. On close examination I found a number of small, black snails and other minute mollusks in the sand thrown out. The stomach of one shot contained only the minute mollusks and some coarse sand.

Doctor Stejneger (1885) found turnstones feeding in large numbers on the killing grounds in the Commander Islands, “where thousands of putrified carcasses of the slain fur seals swarm with myriads of the white larvae of the flesh fly,” on which they grow very fat. Francis H. Allen tells me he has seen them feeding on rocks which are bare only at low tide and covered with barnacles. One that he watched--

sometimes simply picked its food up from among the barnacles and rockweed, and sometimes it hammered away in one spot like a woodpecker before getting its morsel. The object hammered was evidently fixed. After the bird had flown, I visited the spot and found many empty barnacle shells--empty of barnacles, that is--some entirely empty and others containing small snail-like mollusks with dark-colored shells.

On the coast of South Carolina I have seen turnstones feeding on the beds of coon oysters and have watched them busily engaged in chasing the small fiddler crabs on the muddy banks of tidal creeks and on the mud lumps; they had to run very fast to catch the spry little animals and probably had to pick out the smallest ones. Mr. Wayne (1910) says: “On Capers Island it frequents live oak trees which are covered with small mussels, upon which it eagerly feeds. If some of the mussels happen to be on an inclined limb the birds walk, instead of flying, to reach them. I have seen as many as four of these, one behind the other, on a small limb out in the surf.”

Mr. Manniche (1910) says that just after their arrival in Greenland the turnstones feed mainly on vegetable food; the stomach of a bird taken on May 22 contained only remains of plants. Dr. Paul Bartsch (1922), referring to his visit to Midway Island, writes: “It was a decided surprise to us to find waders in bushes feeding upon berries, and yet this was the case here. Again and again we flushed bunches of turnstones from the dense Scaevola thickets and watched them circle about for some time, only to realight in the tops of another clump of bushes. Specimens shot on Sand Island were filled with Scaevola berries.”

C. J. Maynard (1896) says that they sometimes resort to marshes and feed on grasshoppers. Their main food supply evidently consists of small crustaceans, small mollusks, insects, and their larvae, all of which they consume in large quantities and in great variety. In Massachusetts it is sometimes called the “horse-foot snipe,” because of its fondness for the eggs of the horse-foot crab. John T. Nichols tells me that it scratches up the eggs by “jumping in the air and striking with both its feet at once into the sand, thus making a hole about 3 inches deep and 1½ inches across.”

Dr. Alexander Wetmore contributes the following interesting notes:

The greatest surprise came when on Laysan Island it was found that these and other shore birds were persistent enemies of the sooty and gray-backed terns, as they destroyed the eggs of the terns at every opportunity. For the first few days when turnstones were seen greedily eating terns’ eggs I supposed that they were merely finishing eggs that had been opened by other birds, but on further observation found that these shore birds were bold marauders that drove their bills into the eggs of terns at every opportunity and were only prevented from attacking the nests of boobies and man-o-war birds by the fact that the shell of the egg in these species was so hard that they could not break it. As we moved through the great colonies of sooty terns the birds near at hand rose before us from their eggs, often communicating the alarm to neighbors so that at times clouds of birds arose to fill the air. At our heels, 15 or 20 feet behind us, came little groups of turnstones well aware that this uproar among the sharp-beaked terns meant unprotected nests, where they could attack the eggs with impunity. The turnstones ran quickly about driving their bills into the eggs without the slightest hesitation, breaking open the side widely and feeding eagerly on the contents, sometimes two or three gathering for an instant to demolish one egg and then with this one half consumed running on to attack another. The havoc wrought among the terns was so great that we forbade the sailors from approaching the colonies, and made it a rule among the naturalists to keep away except when necessity for some observation made it imperative to disturb the birds.

The densely packed colonies of aggressive sooty terns were open to attack mainly along the borders except when the birds were disturbed, but the little scattered groups of gray-backed terns (Sterna lunata) on the open beaches were entirely at the mercy of the turnstones, so that it seemed that the gentle terns could not hope for a successful nesting until the close of May carried the horde of their marauding persecutors away to northern homes. So bold were the shore birds that on one occasion I saw two actually push aside the feathers on the sides of the incubating tern, drag her egg from beneath her breast, and proceed to open and devour it within 6 inches of the nest. The tern remained in incubating pose, plainly troubled by such unexpected boldness but seemingly not comprehending its portent, nodding her head with that of her mate standing beside her, and finally reaching out to draw the half-empty shell of her treasure again beneath her, while the robbers, temporarily satisfied, pattered away in search of other prey. On several occasions when, in walking along the beaches above high-tide mark I flushed gray-backed terns from their nests, I saw that they carried with them as they flew away shells of broken eggs, which not understanding that they had been destroyed they had covered while the hardening albumen flowing over the outside of the shell had glued the whole to their feathers.

The Rev. F. C. R. Jourdain contributes the following notes on the food of this species:

As it is almost invariably found near the coast the food is chiefly marine in character: Mollusca, chiefly small univalves such as Litorina (L. Florence records 134 opercula of small molluscks); small Crustacea, especially Gammaridae; A. H. Clark records fry of a small fish (Sicydium plumieri) up to 1½ inches in length; insects, including Coleoptera, Diptera (Tipulidae and larvae of Chironomidae), Lepidoptera (Argynnis charidea and Dasychira groenlandica) recorded by H. C. Hart and Hymenoptera. Also Arachnida and Acaridea (Feilden). Also some vegetable matter (seeds of Draba alpina, pieces of seaweed, etc.).

Behavior.--When migrating turnstones fly in large flocks by themselves or with black-bellied plovers, often in immense flocks; at such times they usually fly high. But, while sojourning on the way, they are usually in small numbers and very often seen singly. One or two birds are often associated with mixed flocks or scattered gatherings of semipalmated plover, sanderlings, or other small waders. Their flight is strong, swift, and steady, usually direct, but sometimes in a semicircle, out from the shore and back again; when not traveling they generally fly low. There is something peculiar about their flight which can be recognized at a long distance, but I can not describe it satisfactorily. They are essentially shore birds, frequenting the stony, rocky, or sandy beaches of the seashore or the larger lakes. They are not particularly shy, and sometimes very tame. When they first alight they stand and survey the landscape until sure that they are safe. They then mingle freely with the other small waders, feeding unconcernedly, and treating their companions with indifference until one comes too near. Then the turnstone shows its jealous and pugnacious disposition; it will allow no competition, in the spot where it is feeding, from another bird, even of its own species, but with lowered head, drooping wings, and hunched up back it rushes at the intruder in a threatening attitude and perhaps gives him a few jabs with its sharp bill. Many a miniature cockfight or sham battle is enacted and the turnstone is generally the aggressor, though once I saw a sanderling drive away a turnstone. It appears like a big bully that is attracted to the feast that others have found and then is unwilling to share it with them.

Turnstones can swim well and probably alight on the water to rest while making long flights over the ocean. Dr. Donald B. MacMillan (1918) saw “a large flock alight upon the water in Kennedy Channel.” They love to bathe in shallow water, squatting down and fluttering their wings, sometimes partly rolling over; then they spend much time preening and dressing their pretty plumage. N. B. Moore says in his notes that “this species alights on the dead branches of mangroves, stumps, and stakes that stand in the water near the shore from 2 to 6 feet above it and sits in the manner of a Carolina dove.”

Voice.--John T. Nichols has contributed the following on the ordinary notes of the turnstone:

The common flight note of this species is an unloud polysyllabic one, something like a cackle, which does not carry far. It is usually given by birds that are leaving the vicinity, but not so frequently heard at other times as are the flight notes of various species. This note is sometimes three syllabled, ketakek, or may be of a single syllable, kek, on taking wing. A much rarer, loud, plover-like kik-kyu has been heard from a turnstone when coming to decoys or flying along the edge of favorable marshes. The cackle of the turnstone is almost impossible to imitate, but they will decoy readily to a whistled imitation of the cry of their associate the black-bellied plover.