EASTERN WILLET 31 



extremes. They are generally boldly and irregularly marked with 

 both large and small spots and blotches, but sometimes they are 

 quite evenly covered with small spots; rarely they are blotched 

 around the large end only. The markings are mostly in dark browns, 

 " burnt umber," " bister," " sepia " and " clove brown," but sometimes 

 they are in lighter, olive browns. The underlying markings are in 

 various shades of " brownish drab " or " drab gray." The measure- 

 ments of 56 eggs average 52.5 by 38 millimeters; the eggs showing 

 the four extremes measure 60.5 by 38, 53.5 by 40, 49 by 37, and 50 by 

 36 millimeters. 



Young. — ^The period of incubation seems to be unknown. Both 

 sexes share in the care of the young, which run soon after hatching. 

 Arthur T. Wayne (1910) says: 



The young are hatched by May 29, and the parents sometimes remove them 

 between the thighs (as the woodcock is also known to do) to a place of safety, 

 fully a quarter of a mile away. I observed this trait oa May 29, 1899. I found 

 a nest in an oat field, which contained one young bird just hatched and three 

 eggs on the point of hatching. I remained near the place until the eggs were 

 hatched, and the willets were greatly alarmed all the time. Presently I saw 

 one of the old birds remove a young one and fly with it across three creeks 

 and marsh land to an island a quarter of a mile away. This was repeated until 

 all the young were removed. 



Plumages. — The downy young willet is rather prettily and quite 

 distinctively marked. There is a distinct loral stripe of brownish 

 black, a post ocular stripe and a median frontal stripe of " warm 

 sepia." The chin and throat are white and the rest of the head is 

 pale buff, mixed with grayish white, heavily mottled on the crown 

 with " warm sepia." The down of the hind neck and upper back is 

 basally sepia with light buff tips. The rest of the upper parts are 

 variegated with pale buff, grayish white and " warm sepia " ; but in 

 the center of the back is a well marked pattern of four broad stripes 

 of " warm sepia " and three of light buff, converging on the rump 

 and between the wings. The under parts are buffy white. 



The young bird begins to acquire its juvenal plumage before it 

 is half grown, beginning with the scapulars, back and wings; then 

 comes the plumage of the breast and crown, and lastly the neck, 

 rump and tail. In the full juvenal plumage, in July, the feathers 

 of the crown, back, scapulars and wing coverts are "sepia"; those 

 of the crown are tipped, those of the back and scapulars are broadly 

 edged or notched and those of the wing coverts are still more 

 broadly edged with " pale pinkish buff " ; the greater coverts are 

 irregularly barred, variegated or sprinkled with sepia; the rest of 

 the wing is as in the adult ; the rump is " hair brown," narrowly 

 tipped with buffy white ; the upper tail coverts are white, indistinctly 

 barred with dusky near the tips ; the central tail feathers are barred 



