214 ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 



here, and it comes, undoubtedly, to feed upon the larvfe and maggots 

 of tlie killing grounds. It is certainly one of the most attractive of 

 plovers as it struts and marches with bright-red legs and intense- 

 black banded breast and a back shaded with brown and green reflec- 

 tions/ I am at a loss to fix its breeding i)lace. I have met with it at 

 sea, 700 miles from the nearest land, flying northwest toward the 

 Aleutian Islands, my ship being 800 miles west from the Straits of 

 Fuca. 



10. Lobipes hyperboreus. Northern Phalarope. 



A few couples breed on the islands, nesting around the margins of 

 the lakelets. Th^ egg I was unable to find, but I secured several 

 newly hatched young ones, which were very interesting little crea- 

 tures. They are only 2 or 3 inches long, with bill about a third of an 

 inch in length and no thicker than an ordinary dressing pin. The 

 down of the head, neck, and upper parts is a rich brownish yellow, 

 variegated with black, tlie crown being of this color mixed with yel- 

 low, and a long stripe extends down the back, flanked with one over 

 each hip and another across the rump, and a shoulder spot on each 

 side. The under parts are a grayish, silvery white. The old bird, 

 when startled or solicitous for the safety of its young, utters a sono- 

 rous "tweet" call, quickly repeated, with long intervals of silence 

 between them. 



11. Phalaropus fulicarius. Red Phalarope. 



Though I found this bird very much more abundant than the pre- 

 ceding Species at certain times, yet I am satisfied that it does not 

 breed here. It is found, like the "other, ])y the marshy margins of the 

 pools and ponds, usually solitary, though paired occasionally, but 

 never in flocks. The earliest arrivals occur in June, but the birds 

 reappear in greatest number about the 15th of August. They all 

 leave by the 5th of October. 



12. Tringa ptilocnemis. Thick-billed Sandpiper. " Ko-lits-kie." 



The most interesting result, in some respects, of my ornithological 

 work is the determination by my specimens of the occurrence of this 

 species in abundance on the Pribilof Islands, where it breeds. That 

 discovery adds a species, previously unrecognized as North American, 

 to our fauna. As a long, elaborate, and graphic description of the 

 bird, based upon my collections, was made by Dr. Elliott Coues^ when 

 he reviewed my labor on these islands, I shall not duplicate it here; 

 but I wish to give him credit for his prompt recognition of the nov- 

 elty; and in this connection let me add that in 1874 I saw it just as 

 abundantly on 8t. Matthew Island. I should say it is the only wader 

 that incubates on the Pribilof Islands, witli the marked exception of 

 a stray couple now and then of Phalaropus liyperhoreus. It makes 

 its appearance early in May and repairs to the dry uplands and mossy 

 hummocks, where it breeds. The nest is formed by the selection of 

 a particular cryptogamic bunch, and there sitting, it lays four 

 darkly blotched pyriform eggs and hatches them within twenty days. 

 The young come from the shell in a thick, yellowish down, with dark- 

 brown markings on the head and back, getting the plumage of their 

 parents and taking to wing as early as the 10th of August. At this 

 season old and young flock together for the first time, and confine 



1 Condition of Affairs in Alaska. H. W. Elliott. 1874, p. 182. 



