GREY PLOVER. =^79 



as the water flowed the noise made by the masses of birds, 

 forced by the rising waters to the circumscribed space of 

 dry sand, was marvellous, and finally the host rose like an 

 immense cloud ; but next day they had all disappeared. In 

 seasons when the weather remains mild and open in the 

 early months of the year, the lowlands are frequented until 

 late in March by hosts of Plovers, a few occasionally lingering 

 till the middle of May. 



As stated above, our local breeding birds resort to the moors 

 in March or April, and at the end of the latter month, or in 

 May, the foreigners move northward ; in May 1904, I noticed 

 a very large assemblage of unpaired birds on a moor near 

 Harrogate. 



The Golden Plover is frequently immolated against the 

 lanterns of our coast beacons ; many were thus killed at 

 Spurn Lighthouse on i6th November 1898 ; and in the very 

 severe winter of 1878-79 numbers were starved to death in 

 the neighbourhood of Flamborough. In autumn and winter 

 the species is generally distributed in the agricultural districts 

 of the county, in large or small numbers, varying with the 

 severity or mildness of the season. 



Nidification, as a rule, begins in late April or early May. 



Variations of plumage are seldom met with ; Mr. F. Boyes 

 has obtained two specimens with white wings, and a beautiful 

 white and buff-coloured example was killed at Wycliffe-on- 

 Tees in February 1900. 



GREY PLOVER. 



Squatarola helvetica (Z.). 



Winter visitant, abundant on the coast, and observed both on its 

 autumnal and vernal passage, less frequently at the latter period. 

 Arrives in August, September, and late in October, many passing 

 southward for winter. Is noticed in May, in summer plumage, both 

 on the coast and inland on the moors. 



Probably the first notice of the Grey Plover in Yorkshire 

 is found in the Allan MS., in connection with the Tunstall 



