OREOPH1LUS RUFICOLLIS. 



175 



distinguished in the family it belongs to by the great length of its 

 straight slender probe-like bill, unlike that of any other Plover ; and it 

 also has other structural peculiarities, the toes being exceptionally 

 short and thick, the frontal bone curiously modified, and the eyes 

 enormously large, like those of a nocturnal species. I do not think, 

 however, that it migrates by night, as I have never heard its peculiar 

 passage-cry after dark. A flock is usually composed of from a dozen 



SLENDER-BILLED PLOVER. 

 (Seebohm's < Plovers,' p. 111.) 



to thirty individuals, and when on the ground they scatter widely, 

 running more rapidly than any other Plover I am acquainted with. 

 When they travel the flight is swift and high, the birds much scattered. 

 They possess no mellow or ringing tones like other members of the 

 Plover family ; on the ground they are silent, but when taking wing 

 invariably utter a long tremulous reedy note, with a falling inflection, 

 and usually repeated three or four times. The sound may be imitated 

 by striking on the slackened strings of a guitar. This cry is frequently 

 uttered while the birds are migrating. 



On the Rio Negro in Patagonia I observed this Plover only in the 

 winter season ; but Durnf ord found it nesting in the valley of the 

 Sengel in Chupat in the month of December. 



