By PHILLIPS RUSSELL
Banding Shore Birds
9
Wc had been noting birds all the
way from Oregon Inlet to Hattcras but
had found few black skimmers, which
were our special target. And then right
back of Tebey 'Fillet's house on the
south side of Oregon Inlet, where we
were staying, we found all the skim¬
mers wc could handle. In fact, we
found in the sand some 75 skimmer
nests virtually in sight of our back
windows, and nearly all contained
young ones. Mingled with these nests
were about twenty of the common tern
and about eight of the least tern.
They Know
Terns arc the most beautiful of shore
birds — shapely, tailored, and spirited,
while skimmers are just the opposite —
bulky, awkward, and clownish. But
their young had found a common de¬
nominator of misery. Although the
month was July and the weather was
warm, a shrill east wind had sprung up
during the night and the young birds
were being buried out of sight by the
flying sand. Yet they all knew what to
do. Just as nature tells the fresh-born
deer to lie motionless until his mother
orders hint to move, it had told these
newly hatched birds to creep behind
any slight wind-break — a bit of wood,
a shell, a leaf, or a faint ridge of sand
—close their eyes, and lie there until
the blow should be over.
The adult skimmer is black, white
and red. He skims, as his name implies,
just over the top of the water, scooping
up his food, minnows and shellfish.
with his lower bill which nature has
thoughtfully made longer than the up¬
per bill. The young ones we picked
out of the blowing sand were chicken¬
like and speckled, with strong legs and
a feebly biting mouth. The chicks of
the terns were smaller and more deli¬
cate. and not combative.
As fast as wc found them on the
beach, only a few yards from the surf,
wc handed then» to Harry T. Davis of
the State Museum (native of Buxton),
who banded them with a light alumi¬
num tag on one leg. and then wc put
them back into the sand, trying when
possible to set then» down behind some
little shelter that would keep the
whistling sand out of their eyes. They
seemed not to mind, and though the
parents flew around us in protesting
circles, they settled down to routine
matters as soon as wc withdrew.
Ugliest Bird
Besides skimmers and terns, we
banded IS young black-crowned nigh!
herons out of 32 nests found on one of
the bushy islands within sight of the
old coast guard station on Pea Island,
which island is a government refuge for
birds. Anything gaunter or uglier than
a young heron does not exist in the
bird world. Yet his mother no doubt
considers him the image of beauty.
On the same island we found nests
of the boat-tailed grackle and the long¬
billed marsh wren. These nests were
substantial structures of twigs or grass,
in contrast to those of the beach birds
which arc content to drop their eggs in
a mere depression in the sand, disre¬
garding the high tides which sometimes
sweep over them.
But the most varied bird life
was found on the little sand heap
called Gull Island, off Buxton. There
David L. Wray, naturalist with the
State Department of Agriculture, re¬
joiced when he identified six princely
birds as Cabot's terns, fairly rare in
North Carolina. The adults ran around
with small fish in their mouths and
seemed to be waiting for us to get out
of the way so they might feed their
black, downy chicks.
Congested Population
This island was so thickly sprinkled
with chicks and eggs that wc were
obliged to walk with care. Here Harry
Davis banded 44 skimmers, three com¬
mon terns, and four royal terns while
David Wray and John H. Grey and I
sprinted over the sand and grass round¬
ing up escaping young birds, some of
which plunged into the water although
they were scarcely strong enough to
stand. John Grey is on Sundays a dig¬
nified Presbyterian preacher — once
at West Raleigh, later at Charlottes¬
ville. Va.. and now at Williamsburg —
but on a holiday he is a fancy foot
worker among birds.
During this stay on the outer banks
below Oregon Inlet wc counted eagles,
ospreys, sparrows, kingfishers, vul¬
tures (black and turkey), crows, laugh¬
ing and herring gulls, barn swallows,
white-eyed vircos. redwings, marlins,
ycllowthroats. larks, gracklcs. bitterns,
willcts, egrets, gallinulcs, and one
whistling swan at Pea Island. L. B.
Turner, manager of the refuge, told us
he had seen golden eagles at Pea
Island as well as the commoner bald
eagles.
The trip showed us how rich North
Carolina is in shore bird life, and how
a man can enjoy birds without shoot¬
ing them or scaring them. And where
can one see such sunsets thrown on
the western sky as on the outer banks?
Ли
expedition to the Banks reveals
a rieli and varied population of wild¬
fowl shares our sand beaches.
2
THE STATE, January 9. 1954