PLOVER 



217 



and pasture fields on the uplands as well as the low 

 marshlands. Frost or deep snow renders their food 

 unprocurable in such situation, and in wintry weather 

 they may for a time frequent the mud-banks along the 

 coast, but many of them will depart to some more 

 temperate climate, returning on the break-up of the 

 frost. In spring the throat and breast feathers of the 

 male Golden Plover are jet black ; in winter these parts 

 are white or dusky white speckled with dull yellow. 

 Length, n in.; very fat birds weigh 10 oz., or more. 



THE GREY PLOVER, Squatarola helvetica, bears, in 

 respect of plumage, some resemblance to the bird last 

 described. Placed side by side, however, the two cannot 

 well be confounded, for the Grey Plover is distinctly 

 whitish- or silvery-grey, and has, moreover, a hind toe 

 which the Golden Plover does not possess. In flight 

 the Grey Plover may also be distinguished by the colour 

 of the axillary plumes below the wings, these being 

 black in both young and old birds, whereas in the 

 Golden Plover they are white. Grey Plover are not so 

 gregarious of habit, neither so numerous in this country 

 as are Golden Plover. They are altogether birds of the 

 shore, and have never been known to nest in these 

 islands. In some districts they go by the name of 

 Silver Plover ; in the Wash district I have frequently 

 heard them called Sand Plover. Length, 12 in., and 

 weight about that of the Golden Plover. 



THE LAPWING or GREEN PLOVER, Vanellus cristatus, 

 is quite familiar to most country residents. It is this 

 bird which lays the plovers' eggs so highly prized by the 

 gourmet. This causes it to be a much-persecuted bird, 

 for in the spring the eggs are taken by thousands, and in 

 autumn and winter the birds themselves are both netted 



