BIRDS OF KANSAS. 147 



Stretched out, the head usually inclining downward and the feet 

 a little upward. At times, before mating, thej are quite noisy. 



Their food consists of aquatic insects, snails, tender water 

 plants, buds, blossoms and seeds of different plants, etc. 



Their nests are placed in tall weeds and rushes growing in 

 shallow, muddy places, in ponds and sloughs; built on the tops 

 of the broken-down old growth that forms a platform just above 

 the water; quite a deep, hollow nest, composed of short, bitten- 

 off stems of the weeds and rushes. Eggs usually eight or nine 

 — I have seen eleven in a nest, 1.92x1.32; cream white, in 

 some cases pale olive drab, thickly and evenly speckled with 

 dark brown; in form, oval to ovate. A set of six eggs, taken 

 from a nest on a marsh, near Horicon, Wisconsin, are, in dimen- 

 sions: 1.90x1.29, 1.92x1.33, 1.92x1.32, 1.90x1.30, 1.92x1.29, 

 1.92x1.33. 



Order LIMICOL^E. 

 shore birds. 



"Neck and legs usually elongated (the latter sometimes excessively so), the 

 tibiae usually more or less naked below. Hind toe short or rudimentary, some- 

 times absent, and inserted above the level of the anterior toes. Habits prseco- 

 cial, and young dasypsedic. Palate schizoguathous. Carotids double." 



Family PHALAROPODIDiE. Phalakopes. 



"Small birds, with Sandpiper-like appearance, but with very full, compact 

 plumage, like that of the Coots, Gulls and Petrels; the tarsus greatly compressed, 

 and the toes partly webbed, as well as fringed, by a lateral (sometimes scalloped) 

 margin." 



Genus PHALAROPUS Bkissokt. 



Bill slender, nearly cylindrical, not perceptibly widened toward the end; nos- 

 trils separated from loral feathers by a space equal to much less than the depth 

 of the upper mandible at the base. {Ridgway.) 



Subgenus PHALAROPUS. 



Wing less than 4.50; tarsus less than 1.00; web between outer and middle 

 toes extending to or beyond second joint of the latter; lateral membrane of all 

 the toes broad and distinctly scalloped. {Ridgway.) 



