Object Status:
Extant
Accession Date:
By 1799
Primary Source Reference:
Charles Willson Peale, diary entry dated 30 August 1793. American Philosophical Society Library, Peale-Sellers Family Collection, Mss.B.P31.
Additional Source Text:
Charles Willson Peale (1741-1827) wrote in his diary on 30 August 1793, during a collecting expedition to Cape Henlopen, Delaware: ."..at my return, I mounted ... a bird called the Til-til, from its cry so called; it is a species of snipe." (American Philosophical Society Library, Peale-Sellers Family Collection, Mss.B.P31).
Peale wrote in the same diary on 4 September: "I staid this morning to dress a Til-Til, and sent Titian out with his Gun ... some others Titian shot after breakfast kept [us] busily employed until after night set in" (Miller 1988: 57, Selected Papers, Vol. 2, part 1, Yale University Press).
Peale wrote, in his 26th Lecture (ca. 1799): "837. Yellow shanks snipe. It has a slender bill 1 ½ [Inches] long, a little bent at the end; head, neck & back speckled with black & a dirty white; belly white. Mr. Pennant has described one that he says appears at New York in Autumn. I found this at Cape Henlopen." (Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University Archives, coll. 40)
Alexander Wilson (1766-1813) described this species under the name "Yellow-shanks Snipe / Scolopax flavipes" in American Ornithology vol. 7 (Pl. 58), where "Peale's Museum, No. 3938" was cited (Wilson 1813: 55). / https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/175507#page/67/mode/1up (text) / https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/175507#page/56/mode/1up (plate)
An unmounted female specimen of "Tringa flavipes (Yellow Shank S)" was listed in "A Catalogue of Duplicate Specimens...", May 1822. [unpublished] American Philosophical Society Library (Mss.B.P31).
Notes:
Peale's "Til-til" seems likely to be this species, based on his description of its voice. Peale's collecting efforts at Cape Henlopen were overlooked by compilers of Delaware bird records, prior to this study (Gene K. Hess, in litt. 10 February 2024).
Specimen Type:
Dead/preserved
Current Common Name:
Lesser Yellowlegs
Current Scientific Name
Scolopacidae | Tringa flavipes
