786 



5 YS TEMA TIC S YNOPSIS. — LIMICOL^. 



black prolongation on side of neck ; lower eyelid white or not. Lower hind-neck, interscap- 

 ulars, and scapulars pied with black and chestnut ; lower back, rump, and upper tail-coverts 

 snowy-white, with a large central blackish field on the latter. Tail white, with broad subter- 

 miual blackish field, narrowing on outer feathers and incomplete, widening usually to cut oS 

 white tips of central feathers. Wing-coverts and long inner secondaries pied like scapulars with 

 black and chestnut ; greater coverts broadly white-tipped or mostly white, short inner seconda- 

 ries entirely white, the rest acquiring dusky on their ends to increasing extent, with result of a 

 broad oblique white wing-bar. Primaries blackish, the longer ones with large white fields on 

 inner webs, the shorter ones also definitely white on outer webs for a space, shafts white unless 

 at end ; primary coverts white-tipped. Under parts, including under wing-coverts, snowy- 

 while ; breast and jugulum jet-black, enclosing a white throat-patch, and sending limbs on sides 



of head and neck as above 

 said. Bill black ; iris black ; 

 feet orange- red. 9 similar, 

 lacking much of the chest- 

 nut, replaced by plain brown, 

 especially on wing-coverts; 

 dark parts in same pattern, 

 but restricted somewhat, 

 the black not jet and glossy. 

 Adults in winter, and young, 

 lacking chestnut, and with 

 the black mostly replaced 

 by browns and grays, that 

 of breast especially restricted 

 or very imperfect; at an 

 early age the feathers of the 

 upper parts skirted with bufi' 

 or tawny. Downy young 

 are dark gray with a yellow- 

 ish tinge, varied with black 

 points, and with black- 

 stripes on the head ; the 

 belly white. Length 8.00- 

 9.00; extent 16.00-19.00; 

 wing 5.50-6.00; tail 2.50; 

 bill 0.80-0.90; tarsus, or 

 middle toe and daw, about 

 J .00. Nearly cosmopolitan ; 

 in North America, both 

 coasts abundantly, and less 



Fig. 537. — Plover-billed Turnstone. (From "North American Shore Birds,'' 

 by D. G. Elliot.) 



frequently on large inland waters; migrating through the U. S., and some wintering in the 

 Gulf States, breeding in high latitudes. Eggs usually 4, 1.60 X 1-12, olive-drab, thickly 

 marked with dark brown. Beautiful and conspicuous among beach birds. 

 A. melanoce'phala. (Gr. fieXas, melas, black; KffpdXrj, Jcephale, head.) Black-headed 

 Turnstone. Without any of the chestnut coloration of the last, parts that are pied in inter- 

 pres being blackish ; white parts, however, and distribution of colored areas, nearly the same. 

 Crown and upper parts with a greenish gloss. Head, neck, throat, and breast brownish-black, 

 the color extending farther along breast than the jet plastron of interpres, and not uniform, but 

 the dark brown nebulated with sooty centres of the feathers, and shaded by mixture of white- 



