264 BULLETIN 14 6, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Nesting. — W. C. Bradbury (1918) has given us a very good ac- 

 count of the nesting habits of the mountain plover in Colorado. Of 

 the nesting site and nest he says : 



The ground is an open, rolling prairie, above the line of irrigation, and is 

 devoted to cattle range. It is several miles from natural surface water and 

 streams, and is covered with short-cropped buffalo or gramma grass, 2 or 3 

 inches high, with frequent bunches of dwarfed prickly pear, and an occasional 

 cluster of stunted shrub or weed, rarely more than a foot in height. With 

 the six sets secured, in no instance had the parent bird taken advantage of the 

 slight protection offered from sight or the elements by the nearby cactus, 

 shrubs or uneven spots of ground. In each case, she had avoided such shelter, 

 locating in the open, generally between the small grass hummocks and not on 

 or in them ; there was no evidence of the parent birds having given more 

 thought to nest preparation or concealment, than does any other plover. In 

 two of the sets the eggs were all individually embedded in the baked earth to 

 R depth of one-eighth to one-fourth of an inch, evidently having settled when 

 the surface of the ground was reduced to soft mud by rain-water collecting 

 in the slight depressions. As the ground dried up the eggs were fixed in a 

 perfect mould or matrix, from which they could not roll. In fact they could 

 hardly be disturbed at all by the sitting birds. The only nesting material 

 v/as a small quantity of fine, dry rootlets and " crowns " of gi-amma grass, 

 the eggs in some instances being slightly embedded in tliis lining. As it is 

 also present in all other depressions on the prairie it is highly probable that 

 here as elsewhere it was deposited about the eggs by the wind and not through 

 the agency of the birds themselves. The protective coloration of the nest 

 and eggs, as well as of the rear view of the birds themselves, even when in 

 motion, is unsurpassed. In no instance, except one hereinafter noted, was the 

 bird seen to leave the nest, nor was any nest found except in the immediate 

 vicinity of moving birds. 



H. G. Hoskin (1893) writes: 



The mountain plover builds its nest on open prairie. The first egg is laid 

 on bare ground, and as the set is finished and incubation advances the bird 

 gradually makes a nest of dirt, pieces of hard grass, roots, etc. It takes five 

 or six days to complete set of three eggs. I have never found more nor less 

 than three eggs in a nest that I thought complete. Old birds will fly off the 

 nest while a person on foot is 80 rods away, but will sit closely for man on 

 horseback or in a buggy. 



William G. Smith (1888) found -three nests while traveling by 

 wagon across the Laramie Plains in Wyoming. " They were all 

 placed within 50 yards of the much-frequented roadway, and each 

 time I saw the female sitting on the eggs. The old birds are very 

 white which contrasts with the dark ground and causes them to be 

 easily seen." The art of feigning lameness or injury, to entice the 

 intruder away from eggs or young, seems to be very highly developed 

 in this species. Mr. Smith speaks of one that seemed to be in a fit, 

 as it lay on its side, within 6 feet of him, " apparently in strong con- 

 vulsions." Mr. Bradbury (1918) tells of one that, "spreading her 



