158 A. L. V. Manniche. 



The brood of the Phalarope must — like that of other small 

 waders — especially be persecuted by Ravens, Skuas {Lestris longi- 

 cauda) and Polar Foxes. 



The only enemy of the full-grown birds is the Gyrfalcon (Falco 

 gyrfalco), which will surprise and capture them when lying on the 

 Avater. 



This I succeeded in observing one day in summer 1907; just as 

 I was observing a male Phalarope, which swam along the beach 

 of a little clear pond hardly two paces from my feet, I suddenly 

 heard a strong whistling in the air and saw an old falcon, that 

 from a dizzy height shot like an arrow towards the surface of the 

 water, caught the Phalarope and again rapidly rose in the air carry- 

 ing the bird in its talons. I saw the bird of prey descend and settle 

 on the summit of a rock near the bay in order to eat its prey. The 

 method, with which the falcon carried out its exploit, proved that 

 several Phalaropes before had the same fate. The Gyrfalcon can 

 certainly not catch a Phalarope in flight. 



The variations in colour of the female are but few and not 

 very obvious. The dark throat-region was by single — I think ra- 

 ther old ~ birds nearly black, but in most individuals it had a 

 greyish tone. The males vary a great deal in colour of breast and 

 belly. Some of them had here an undiversified sorrel colour, other 

 had more or fewer pale feathers and others again were nearly 

 white. In one single male the throat was rather dark but not black. 

 In the majority the dark part was strongly sprinkled with paler fea- 

 thers. In a pair of males I only found a weak indication of throat-spot. 



For the zoological museum in Copenhagen were collected 12 

 Grey Phalaropes and 4 eggs. The following measurements have 

 been taken: 



Locality 



Stormkap 125 22 21 skin. 



In spirit. 



c? - ^^li 08 The ship's-harbour 128 22 22 



