BIRDS OF NANTUCKET

Let's start with some military concepts. Every basic trainee learns "If it moves - salute it! If it doesn't move - paint it!" Creative thinking is really not encouraged.

This week's bird would cause most basic trainees' brains to melt down. If it doesn't move, it's invisible. Where would you put the paint? When they finally do move, they are generally flying away. You could salute, but a wave "good-bye" might be more appropriate.

I first encountered these small, brown songbirds when I lived in Georgia. The original "Birds of Nantucket" (1948) didn't offer much hope for finding one on our island - "Rare vagrant in spring and fall." As a young teenager I had a problem just picturing what a vagrant might look like - perhaps a ragged soul hanging around Main Street?

But back to Georgia - out birding with my friend Terry Moore near Peachtree City, south of Atlanta. From high above us came a whistled double note. "Pipits," called Terry, with a wave (not a salute) to the heavens. I looked up and saw five or six dots bounding buoyantly away and memorized that call. To this day it still sounds like they are whistling "pipit" as they go past.

This is one more bird my wife dismisses as "another little brown job" - an LBJ. This includes most sparrows, many sandpipers, and even our ubiquitous Yellow-rumped Warblers that make Nantucket their winter home. LBJs are a bit of a curse that birders must learn to cope with. Our bird lists are full of them.

Right now this week's bird is known as the American Pipit. A few years ago we called them "Water Pipits" when they were lumped in with the pipits that live across Europe and Asia. The scientific name is Anthus rubescens. The "splitters" have won a battle here and if you see a pipit in Europe, you may add a second species to your bird list. The word "Anthus" goes back to ancient Greece, meaning "a kind of bird," but more than that, it was the name of a youth who was changed into a bird after being kicked by his father's horses!

Pipits are small songbirds belonging to the wagtail family. Actual wagtails live in Europe and Asia and are flashy, long-tailed birds, difficult to ignore and always in motion. There are two pipit species likely to be seen in the U.S., the Sprague's Pipit (that I still need for my Life List) that never strays east of Illinois, and the American Pipit that Griscom and Folger call a "rare vagrant." Surprise though - this bird is actually common from now until the end of October.

If you walk Nantucket's beaches on a sunny fall day, check out the wrack line, that pile of kelp left on the beach by the waves. This decaying vegetation is a little ecosystem unto itself and the small insects buzzing around there are food for many creatures including American Pipits. Pipits are birds of open spaces, short grass fields, and yes, wrack lines. In the summer they live in the high Arctic, all the way up to 70 degrees north in Greenland. Their simple grass nests are often sheltered by a mossy boulder. They spend the very short Arctic summer there, courting with their ecstatic flight songs hundreds of feet in the air, then floating like falling leaves to the ground. Their four or five eggs take two weeks to hatch and then another two before the chicks can leave the nest. In the western U.S. they nest in the highest mountain regions, above the tree line.

The key to actually seeing a pipit is to watch a flock land and then carefully approach the spot. Then be patient. It will almost seem like the ground will start to move. Pipits walk rather than hop. Their little heads bob like a pigeon's and their tails twitch almost continuously. They are slender-billed, mainly brown, streaked below, and show white flags on the sides of their tails as they take off. Once you find one, you'll undoubtedly spot another - and more. Last October the Sunday birders were charmed to see 20 of them working a stubble field near Hummock Pond.

Most American Pipits spend the winter in our southern states but a few hang around on Nantucket to be counted on our Christmas Bird Census, being found seven out of the last 10 years. Most American Pipits take a more western route going north in the spring but we still expect to find a few here every April.

If you are lucky enough to see a pipit on the ground, be sure and salute it. But look hard. If nothing moves, you'll have to do a lot of painting. I

George C. West creates illustrations for these articles.