_Field marks._--The dowitcher when standing is a fat, chunky bird, with short greenish legs and a very long bill, with which it probes perpendicularly. In flight it also appears stout and usually carries its long bill pointed slightly downward; in adult plumage it appears very dark colored. It has none of the slender appearance of the yellow-legs and its flight is steadier. When seen flying away from the observer the grayish white central band on its back is conspicuous, as are the black and white, barred tail feathers.
_Fall._--The dowitcher is one of the earliest of the fall migrants; probably the first arrivals are birds that, for one reason or another, have failed to raise broods of young, for the time elapsing between the late-spring migration and the early-fall flight is not sufficient for successful breeding. The first adults arrive on Cape Cod early in July; my earliest date is July 4. Adults are common all through July, and I have seen them as late as August 16. The young birds come along later, from August 8 to September 25. While with us they frequent the mud flats and edges of muddy ponds or bays in the marshes; they are seldom seen on the sandy beaches or far out on the sand flats. They associate freely with the smaller sandpipers, least, and semipalmated, or with the semipalmated plover and turnstones. Often in the great flocks of these small sandpipers a number of dowitchers may be easily recognized by their much larger size and very dark appearance, also by their much longer bills. They are then often concentrated in compact groups or strung out in a long line, close to the edge of the water, probing in the soft mud with quick strokes of their long bills. They are easily approached at such times, as they are almost as tame and unsuspicious as the little peep. When the flats are covered at high tide these birds resort to the salt marshes or meadows, where they rest and sleep; in such places they often lie very close and flush singly, much after the manner of Wilson snipe.
_Game._--Dowitchers, or "brown backs," as they are called on Cape Cod, have been popular game birds, and immense numbers have been shot in past years. Audubon (1840) says that "it is not at all uncommon to shoot 20 or 30 of them at once. I have been present when 127 were killed by discharging three barrels, and have heard of many dozens having been procured at a shot." Edward Sturtevant says that a market hunter near Newport, Rhode Island, shot 1,058 dowitchers during the years from 1867 to 1874. Their popularity and their tameness nearly caused the extermination of the species. Mr. John C. Cahoon (1888) wrote then: