THE YELLOW LEGS. 



^^/ ELL( 



.OW LEGS, or Lesser 

 ^( Tell tale sometimes called 

 \q) Yellow-leg Snipe, and Little 

 Cucu, inhabits the whole of 

 North America, nesting in the cold 

 temperate and snbarctic districts of the 

 northern continent, migrating south 

 in winter to Argentine and Chili. It 

 is much rarer in the western than 

 eastern province of North America, 

 and is only accidental in Europe. It 

 is one of the wading birds, its food con- 

 sisting of larvae of insects, small shell 

 fish and the like. 



The nest of the Lesser Yellow 

 Shanks, which it is sometimes called, 

 is a mere depression in the ground, 

 without any lining. Sometimes, how- 

 ever, it is placed at the foot of a bush, 

 with a scantv lining of withered leaves. 

 Four eggs of light drab, bufify or cream 

 color, sometimes of light brown, are 



laid, and the breast of the female is 

 found to be bare of feathers when en- 

 gaged in rearing the young. The 

 Lesser Yellow legs breeds in central 

 Ohio and Illinois, where it is a regular 

 summer resident, arriving about the 

 middle of April, the larger portion of 

 flocks passing north early in May and 

 returning about the first of September 

 to remain until the last of October. 



A nest of this species of Snipe was 

 found situated in a slight depression at 

 the base of a small hillock near the 

 border of a prairie slough near Evans- 

 ton, Illinois, and was 'made of grass 

 stems and blades. The color of the 

 eggs in this instance was a deep gray- 

 ish white, three of which were marked 

 with spots of dark brown, and the 

 fourth egg with spots and well defined 

 blotches of a considerably lighter shade 

 of the same. 



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