BLACK-NECKED STILT 51 



Plumages. — Robert Ridgway (1919) describes the downy young 

 stilt as follows : 



Upper parts light buffy grayish mottled with dusky, the back and rump 

 with several large blotches of black ; head, neck, and under parts buffy whitish 

 or brownish white, the crown, occiput, and hiudneck grayish, the crown with 

 a mesial streak of black, the occiput with several irregular spots of the same. 



The juvenal plumage appears first on the scapulars, back and 

 breast ; and the tail is the last to appear. The young bird is fully 

 feathered, except the tail, by the time it is two-thirds grown. In 

 fresh juvenal plumage the color pattern is much like that of the 

 adult female; the crown, hind neck, back and wings are brownish 

 black, all the feathers being edged or tipped with " cinnamon " ; 

 the edgings are narrowest on the head, upper back and wing coverts, 

 and broadest on the scapulars and tertials; the face, sides of the head 

 and all under parts are white ; the central tail feathers are dusky and 

 the others are white, washed with dusky near the tip, and all tipped 

 with pinkish buff. This plumage is worn all through the fall and 

 winter, with no change except by wear and fading; before winter 

 the edgings have largely disappeared. 



A partial prenuptial molt of the body plumage occurs in early 

 spring, when young birds become indistinguishable from adults, 

 except for some retained juvenal wing coverts. Adults probably 

 have a partial prenuptial molt in early spring and a complete post- 

 nuptial molt in late summer, but there are no well marked seasonal 

 differences in plumage. 



Food. — Doctor Wetmore (1925) writes: 



Stilts feed by picking up insects on muddy shores or in shallow water, and 

 though not averse to frequenting alkaline areas, on the whole prefer fresher 

 water than do avocets. For detailed analysis, SO stomachs of the black-necked 

 stilt were available, distributed from March to August, and collected in Cali- 

 fornia, Utah, Florida, and Porto Rico. Vegetable food in these amounted to 

 only 1.1 per cent, whereas the animal matter formed 98-9 per cent. The birds 

 are adept in seizing rapidly moving prey and in general are very methodical 

 in their manner of obtaining food. Gravel is picked up to some extent to aid 

 digestion, and part of the seeds taken may have been swallowed for the same 

 purpose. 



The animal food consisted mainly of insects, aquatic bugs and 

 beetles making up the largest items; dragonfly nymphs, caddisflies, 

 mayfly nymphs, flies, billbugs, mosquito larvae, and grasshoppers 

 were included. Crawfishes, snails, and a few tiny fishes were eaten. 

 The vegetable food consisted mainly of a few seeds of aquatic and 

 marsh plants. 



Behavior. — The flight of the stilt is steady and direct, but not 

 particularly swift; the bill is held straight out in front and the legs 



