CHARADRIID.^. 



541 



THE LITTLE RINGED PLOVER. 



^:gialitis curonica (J. F. Gmelin). 



The true Little Ringed Plover is one of the rarest of our occa- 

 sional visitors, and the genuine instances of its occurrence appear to 

 be the following :— Years ago, Doubleday obtained an example at 

 Shoreham in Sussex, and Mr. W. Borrer has another, shot near the 

 mouth of Chichester Harbour, in May ; Rodd's collection contains 

 one killed on October 23rd 1863, at Trescoe in the Scilly Islands; 

 while on Kingsbury Reservoir in Middlesex, in August 1864, Mr. 

 Harting and Mr. R. H. Mitford each obtained an immature bird ; 

 and in the Seebohm collection at the British Museum there is an 

 adult female shot at Freshwater, Isle of Wight, in August. Others 

 have been recorded from time to time in ' The Zoologist ' and else- 

 where, but all those which have been submitted to competent 

 authorities have proved to be specimens of the small Continental 

 form of the Ringed Plover. The distinctions between the two are 

 mentioned at the end of this article. 



It is somewhat remarkable that the Little Ringed Plover should 

 so seldom visit us, inasmuch as it is common on the Continent at 

 no great distance from our shores. It is only a wanderer to the 

 Faroes, but it nests in Scandinavia, and according to Bogdanow, 

 occurs sparingly as far north as 64-66° N. lat. in Russia ; while it 

 owes its specific name to its occurrence in Courland, and it breeds 



