RED-THROATED PIPIT 49 



about the little cultivated meadows and damp patches with scrubby 

 growth of Salix and birch close to the little towns. I have, however, 

 found it plentiful in a quite different type of habitat from those above 

 mentioned, on the island of Vardo, off the same coast. Here its 

 chosen terrain consisted of a certain amount of grass pasture, a cer- 

 tain amount of heathy ground with the usual Arctic heath association 

 dominated by crowberry (Empetrum, nigrum)^ and considerable out- 

 crops of rock with no scrub at all. 



Nesting. — The nest is built on the gi"ound in a recess in the side of 

 a hummock in marsliy localities, often sheltered by scrub growth of 

 dwarf birch, willow, or other plants or sometimes, as I have seen it, 

 on the grassy verge of a roadside or near the borders of a meadow 

 near small farmsteads or villages. It is built of dry grass and bents 

 lined with similar but finer material, with occasionally some hair, but 

 without feathers. The owners tend to show up more than in the case 

 of the meadow pipit and, Maj. W. M. Congreve (1036) describes the 

 male as noisy and conspicuous, always giving away the fact that he 

 has a nest in the vicinity. 



Eggs. — The eggs aie described by Jourdain in the Handbook of 

 British Birds (1938) as variable, ranging from types with evenly 

 freckled markings on a blue-gray ground to an almost uniform 

 ochreous with a dark hair line, or with rich mahogany-red cloudings 

 or bold sepia markings on an olive-gray ground. He gives the fol- 

 lowing measurements of 100 eggs: average, 19.2 by 14.2; maximum, 

 21 by 14.3 and 18.1 by 15.1 ; minimum, 17.1 by 13.9 and 18 by 13.4 

 minimum. Congreve (1936) considers them less variable than those 

 of the meadow pipit and states that they commonly have blackish 

 spots sometimes with a "penumbra" and to a limited extent bunting- 

 like streaks. According to Jourdain the clutch is usually six, some- 

 times five, rarely four or seven, and the season is from about mid- 

 June to early in July. Congreve in Arctic Norway found the earliest 

 nest in 1935 (c/7, fresh) on June 20, and fresh or slightly incubated 

 eggs until the end of the month, and Blair (1936) in the same region 

 records full clutches from June 16 to 24, while Williams (1941) in a 

 late season found no full sets until early in July. The experiences of 

 other observers, to much the same effect, are summarized by Pleske 

 (1928). 



Young. — Only the hen has been found incubating, and Congreve 

 states that she is fed by the male both on and off the nest. Both 

 parents feed the young, of which, in the short Arctic summer, only 

 one brood is reared. "Injury-feigning" by a bird off a nest is recorded 

 by Williams (1941). An exact fledging period is not recorded. 



Plwniages. — Tlie plumages are fully described by H. F. Witherby 

 (1938, vol. 1) in the Handbook of British Birds. The nestling has 



