GREY PLOVER. 203 
weather, when unable to obtain food in the fields, the 
Golden Plovers move with the Lapwings to the coast, 
returning aS soon as a thaw sets in. The migratory 
flocks sometimes remain in the lowlands until after 
the resident birds have returned to their nesting 
quarters on the moors. On April 9th, 1887, we saw 
birds in breeding plumage at the head of the Goyt 
Valley, and five days later we met with three small 
flocks still lingering in the low-lying meadows near 
Sale. 
The Longdendale shepherds know the Golden Plover 
as the ‘Sheep’s Guide.’ They say that the bird’s liquid 
tlui warns the sheep on these lonely moors of the 
approach of a human being, and causes them to run 
from the intruder. 
GREY PLOVER. 
SQUATAROLA HELVETICA (Linnzeus). 
The Grey Plover is a regular winter visitor to the 
estuaries of the Dee and Mersey, where it is sometimes 
seen feeding in considerable flocks on the sandbanks 
and mudflats. It is much more of a shore bird than 
the Golden Plover, and we have no record of its 
occurrence inland in Cheshire. The late H. Durnford, 
speaking of the large numbers of Grey Plovers which 
frequented the mouth of the Mersey in September 
1873, remarked that they did not associate with other 
Waders, although occasionally a straggler might be seen 
with a party of Dunlins.! 
1 Zoologist, ser. 11. vol. ix. p. 3912. 1874. 
