SNIPES, SANDPIPERS 177 



tail coverts usually white. Immature plumage : back and scapulars brownish 

 black with burr of ochraceous borders to the feathers ; head on top ochraceous, 

 streaked with black; below plain buffy forwards, whitish toward rear, 

 (Ridgw.). Wing 6.40 ; culmen 1.25 ; tarsus 1.75. (Ridgw.). 



Geog. Dist.— Northern parts of Old World ; casually straggling to Maine, 

 Massachusetts, Ontario, Ohio, Long Island and New Jersey. 



County Records. — Cumberland ; a female taken at Scarboro, April 10, 1870, 

 (Smith, F. & S. 20, p. 85). Knox; a female taken at Camden, September 

 14, 1900, by Sidney Clark, (Thayer, Auk 1905, p. 409). Oxford; a young 

 female taken at Upton, September 8, 1874, (Brewster, B. N. 0. C. 1, p. 19). 



The three specimens taken in Maine all were females. An- 

 other specimen taken by Mr. Boardman at Grand Menan, New 

 Brunswick, has been most persistently cited as a Maine specimen 

 in spite of many subsequent corrections. 



The male birds are adorned with a most peculiar and notice- 

 able ruff and cape which is of wonderfully great individual 

 variation in color, while the female bird, called Reeve, is with 

 out this splendor. The males are most strenuously pugnacious 

 in the mating season and are said to indulge in most protracted 

 fights with one another. 



The four eggs are said to be laid in a slight nest of grass 

 placed on a slight elevation among the grass in swamps and 

 marshes. They are said to breed more or less commonly in 

 England, Scotland, Scandinavia, Denmark and Lapland. The 

 eggs are oblong pyriform shape, of an olive or grayish green 

 ground color, rather heavily marked and blotched with umber 

 and blackish brown. Davie gives measurements of four eggs 

 in his cabinet from England as 1.64 x 1.17, 1.79 x 1.20, 1.64 

 X 1.18, 1.75 X 1.12. 



Genus BARTRAMIA Lesson. 



261. Bartramia longicauda (Bechst.). Bartramian Sand- 

 piper; Upland Plover; Field Plover; Grass Plover; Prairie 

 Pigeon; Prairie Snipe. 



Plumage of adults : head and neck streaked with black and huffish ; back 

 and wing coverts brownish with ochraceous or buffy edging and black bars 

 and spots ; primaries fuscous, outer primary white barred ; two middle tail 



