THE RED PHALAROPE. 703 
shafts; the greater coverts tipped with white, the inner primaries white-edged 
basally, and the secondaries extensively white at base; upper tail-coverts black, 
with ochraceous tips centrally, plain cinnamon laterally. Adult male: Very simi- 
lar, but smaller; white on sides of head reduced; crown and hind-neck streaked 
with ochraceous. Adults in winter: Quite different. Upperparts ashy, nearly 
uniform; wing darker ash or blackish, but with white bar as before; head and 
neck all around, and entire underparts pure white, or ashy-washed on sides only; 
a dusky space about eye, and another on hind head. immature: Above dull black, 
with ochraceous edgings ; wing-coverts, rump, and upper tail-coverts plumbeous,— 
the first bordered by buffy and the last by ochraceous; remainder of head and 
neck and lower parts white, tinged with brownish buff on the throat and chest 
(Ridgw.). Length about 8.00 (203.2) ; wing 5.35 (135.9); tail 2.15 (54.6) ; bill 
.86 (21.8); tarsus .80 (20.3); middle toe and claw .93 (23.6). 
Recognition Marks.—Chewink size; lobate feet (1n common with other Pha- 
laropes) ; broadened sulcate bill distinctive; a little larger than the next. 
Nesting.—Does not breed in Washington. Nest: a slight hollow in the 
ground, lined with a few bits of moss and grasses. Eggs: 3 or 4, pale drab or 
olivaceous, spotted and blotched with dark browns. Av. size, 1.25x.88 (31.8 
X22 0) 
General Range.—Northern parts of northern hemisphere, breeding from 
Maine northward and in Arctic regions, and migrating south in winter; in the 
United States south in the interior to the Middle States, on the Pacific Coast 
south to Cape St. Lucas; chiefly maritime. 
Range in Washington.—Common migrant, but appearing chiefly in open 
water off the West Coast and in the Straits of Juan de Fuca. 
Authorities.—Baird, Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv. 1858. IX. p. 707. T. C&S. 
Specimens.—(U. of W.) Prov. 
WE, have only the most meager information as to the occurrence of this 
species in Washington, a specimen taken by Mr. Clark P. Streator at Ilwaco, 
Noy. 9, 1889, and two observed by Cooper as they swam in the surf after a 
storm, on Shoalwater Bay. The Red Phalarope is more exclusively maritime 
than the other members of this group, being found in the breeding season only 
along the coasts of the northern Atlantic and Pacific, and the Arctic Oceans. 
Tt is of necessity chained to shore for a season by the bonds of the reproductive 
instinct ; but once the little family is reared, on some Arctic flat or bleak ice- 
bound islet, the Phalaropes gather in great companies and put out to the open 
sea. The dainty birds are expert swimmers, and are the most at home upon the 
water of any of the Limicole. Whalers affirm that the appearance of Phala- 
ropes is a good index of the near presence of some large cetacean, especially of 
the Bow-head, or Right Whale (Balena mysticetus), since the birds delight in 
the same sort of sea-forage as that upon which the whales subsist. Only the 
freezing of the Arctic waters induces these hardy adventurers to quit their 
frigid haunts; and if they wander down our coast in late autumn, it is only be- 
cause time hangs heavy upon their wings until they may return to those en- 
chanted seas. 
