Clear bright comfortable weather: Plover

November 28. 

Paddled to Clamshell. Still very clear and bright as well as comfortable weather. River not so high as on the 16th. 

 "In Massachusetts, and to the eastward of that state, 

this species is best known by the name of 'Upland Plover,'” 

  ~ J. J. Audubon 

Were those plover which just after sunset flew low over the bank above the railroad and alighted in the opposite meadow, with some white in tails like larks?

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, November 28, 1854

I would know when in the year
to expect certain thoughts and moods,
as the sportsman knows 
when to look for plover.
September 24, 1859

Were those plover? SeeSeptember 19, 1854 ("An upland plover goes off from Conantum top (though with a white belly), uttering a sharp white, tu white. "); . September 4, 1860 ("On Conantum an upland plover"); September 9, 1858 ("Heard a short plover-like note from a bird flying high across the river."); June 16, 1855 ("From time to time, summer and winter and far inland, I call to mind that peculiar prolonged cry of the upland plover on the bare heaths of Truro in July, heard from sea to sea, though you cannot guess how far the bird may be, as if it were a characteristic sound of the Cape"); July 12, 1855 ("The upland plover begins with a quivering note somewhat like a tree-toad and ends with a long, clear, somewhat plaintive or melodious hawk-like scream. I never heard this very near to me, and when I asked the inhabitants about it they did not know what I meant.* It hovers on quivering wing, and alights by a steep dive."); June 15, 1860 ("I heard the familiar willet note of the upland plover and , looking up, saw one standing erect — like a large tell tale, or chicken with its head stretched up — on the rail fence. After a while it flew off southwest and lo , then wheeled and went a little higher down the river . Of pigeon size, but quick quivering wings. Finally rose higher and flew more or less zigzag, as if uncertain where it would alight, and at last, when almost out of sight  it pitched down into a field near Cyrus Hubbard's . It was the same note I heard so well on Cape Cod in July, '55. . . I suspect, then  that it breeds here.")

Thoreau's  Upland Plover is the Upland Sandpiper (Bartramia longicauda).His Peetweet  is the Spotted Sandpiper  (Actitis macularia). He also observed the Lesser Golden-Plover (Pluvialis dominica ) and Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus) See Thoreau's Birds