PLOVERS 187 



rarer and more local in its occurrence from about May 12 to 

 late in the month. Only stragglers seem to be met with inland. 



Along the coast they may be seen in small flocks, often asso- 

 ciated with the American Golden Plovers, feeding along the 

 shores or on half tide ledges. As a flock approaches the feeding 

 ground in a quite regular rank they utter frequent whistled calls, 

 and after alighting they run quickly some distance and scatter 

 out before beginning to feed. In fact all their motions are very 

 quick, feeding, running quickly along, making another quick 

 grab at food and pausing to look big-eyed for possible danger. 



Their food consists of small mollusks, worms, small crusta- 

 ceans, brittle stars, small holuthuria and similar material left 

 by the ebbing tide, varied by more or less insects and larvae 

 picked up in the marshes at high tide. In Arctic regions they 

 lay their eggs in slight hollows lined with a little grass. 



The eggs are described as pyriform shaped, light buffy olive 

 to deep olive buff in color, thickly and heavily spotted and 

 marked, chiefly on the major portion with brownish black and 

 black. The marks are often confluent on the larger end. An 

 egg measures 2.00 x 1.41. 



Genus CHARADRIUS Linnaeus. 



272. Charadrius dominiais Mull. American Golden Plover. 



Plumage of summer adults : sides of head and under parts black ; tail 

 brownish gray with faint whitish bars; above black, the feathers spotted 

 and margined with yellow. Plumage of winter adults and immature birds ; 

 above fuscous with yellowish white spots and bars ; below whitish with dusky 

 streaks and bars. Wing 6.90 to 7.60; culmen 0.90; tarsus 1.70. 



Geog. Dist. — North and South America ; breeding in Arctic North America ; 

 wintering from Florida through South America to Patagonia. 



County Records. — Androscoggin ; fairly common migrant, (Johnson). 

 Cumberland; common, (Brock). Hancock; in fall among the islands, 

 (Knight). Kennebec; (Dill). Knox; (Rackliff). Oxford; (Verrill's List 

 Birds Norway). Penobscot ; formerly common in fall, now very rare, 

 (Knight). Piscataquis; migrant, (Homer). Sagadahoc; rare in fall, 

 (Spinney). Somerset; two specimens shot by H. H. Johnson, September 10, 

 1894, (Morrell). Waldo; fall migrant among the islands, (Knight). Wash- 

 ington; not very common, (Boardman). York; (Butters). 



