NOTES ON THE BREEDING HABITS OF THE DOTTEREL 191 



were very early on the hilltops, and it was still very cold. 

 Dr Stewart and I reached the plateau and went practically 

 the whole length of it without seeing anything except a 

 brood of Ptarmigan. We then returned and had almost given 

 up hope of seeing anything of interest (for we were approaching 

 the first mound which we had searched) when I noticed 

 a Dotterel stealing away, without doubt from a nest. After 

 waiting for some time round the corner of the hill we 

 returned and put the bird up again, but we could not see the 

 eggs. We then watched through binoculars and found the 

 nest in about ten minutes. It was within fifty yards of a 

 nest which I had found in 1908, and contained three eggs of 

 the same shape and markings as the 1908 eggs. 



The behaviour of the bird, too, was similar, for instead of 

 sitting close as Dotterel usually do, it went off when we were 

 some distance from the nest. We set a camera with an 

 automatic release and, encouraged by our success, we com- 

 menced again to search the entire plateau. We had not 

 gone very far when I noticed a Dotterel standing watching 

 us. On going towards it it ran about 20 yards and then pre- 

 tended to be wounded, flapping both wings and calling. We 

 were not long in finding a solitary young bird but we could 

 see nothing of any others. The youngster appeared to be 

 about three or four days old. 



Two hundred yards farther on another Dotterel appeared, 

 behaving like the last, and we foui;d two young about two 

 or three days old. We could not find a third, and as we 

 watched through binoculars from a distance when the bird 

 was leading away the young I feel quite confident that 

 there were only two. We went on a little farther without 

 seeing anything of note so we returned to the camera, and 

 found that it had not been set off. We concluded that the 

 eggs were fresh so we left the nest without making any 

 further effort to obtain photographs although both the birds 

 were quite close to us. 



After this we had a remarkable stroke of luck, for just as 

 we were about to leave the plateau we saw a bird stealing 

 away, evidently off a nest, but on watching it through 

 binoculars I saw a young one following it. We went 



