Ruddy Turnstone 137 



Two species are known, one nearly cosmopolitan, the other confined 

 to the coasts of North America. 



Ruddy Turnstone. Arenaria interpres morinella. 



A.O.U. Checklist no 283a— Colorado Records— H. G. Smith 96, p. 65 ; 

 Cooke 97, pp. 69, 201. 



Description. — Male in smnmer — Above, including the wings, varie- 

 gated with chestnut, black and a httle white ; upper tail-coverts white ; 

 tail chiefly black, but white at the base and tips of the feathers ; below 

 white with a black patch on either side of the fore-neck, surrounding 

 white patches on the throat and either side of the head and neck ; 

 iris and bill black, feet orange-red. Length 9-0 ; wing 6-0 ; tail 2-25 ; 

 culmen 9- ; tarsus l-O. 



The female has less chestnut and the black is duller. In winter 

 the upper-parts are brown, the feathers edged with fulvous or grey ; 

 below white with the breast dusky, mottled with whitish. 



Distribution. — Breeding far north from the Mackenzie River to 

 perhaps Melville Island ; south on migration chiefly along the coasts 

 as far as Patagonia and Chile ; rare inland. 



The Turn&tone is a rare straggler to Colorado ; H. G. Smith reported 

 one from Sloans Lake near Denver, killed April 26th, 1890, and 

 R. Borcherdt obtained eight out of a flock on Berkeley Lake, also close 

 to Denver, May 18th, 1900. One of these latter specimens is exhibited 

 in the Colorado Museum of Natural History in Denver. Hersey took 

 one out of a bunch of three at Barr, September 9th, 1907. 



ORDER GALLING. 



This order contains the game-birds, such as Pheasants, 

 Grouse, Turkeys, Brush-Turkeys and Curassows ; they 

 can easily be recognized by their short, arched bills, 

 their strong legs, well adapted to walking, and their 

 rounded, rather feeble wings ; the tarsus is often armed, 

 especially among the males, with a strong, sharp spur ; the 

 hallux is always present, and in all the Colorado species 

 is jointed above the level of the other toes ; the wing 

 has ten primaries, but the number and arrangement 

 of the tail-feathers is subject to considerable variation. 

 The nest is usually placed on the ground, and the young, 



