694 REPORT OF STATE GEOLOGIST. 



nests are extremely difficult to discover the material and the color of 

 the eggs correspond so closely to the appearance of the surrounding 

 surface. If they are disturbed while building, the nest is usually 

 abandoned. Incubation is attended to by the male alone. The female, 

 however, keeps near, and is quick to give the alarm upon the ap- 

 proach of danger. The females are frequently found at this time in 

 small parties of six to eight, and should their breeding ground be 

 approached, exhibit great anxiety, coming from every part of the 

 marsh to meet the intruder, and, hovering over his head, utter a weak, 

 nasal note, which can be heard only a short distance. This note, 

 which is possessed by both sexes, is nearly always made while the birds 

 are in the air, and its production requires, evidently, considerable 

 effort, the head and neck being inclined downward, and then sud- 

 denly raised as the note is uttered, the flight being at the same time 

 momentarily checked. The movements of the birds usually render 

 it an easy matter to decide whether or not they have nests in the im- 

 mediate vicinity. After the first alarm, those having nests at a dis- 

 tance disperse, while others take their course in the form of an ellipse, 

 sometimes several hundred yards in length, with the object of their 

 suspicion in the center, and with long strokes of their wings, much like 

 the flight of a Killdeer, they move back and forth. As their nests are 

 approached the length of their flight is gradually lessened, until at 

 last they are joined by the males, when the whole party hover low 

 over the intruders head, uttering their peculiar note of alarm. At 

 this time they have an ingenious mode of misleading the novice by 

 flying off to a short distance and hovering anxiously over a particular 

 spot in the marsh, as though there were concealed the object of their 

 solicitation. Should they be followed, however, and a search be made 

 there, the maneuver is repeated in another place and still farther from 

 the real location of the nest. But should this ruse prove unavailing, 

 they return and seem to become fairly desperate, flying about one's 

 head, almost within reach, manifesting great distress. 



If possible, still greater agitation is shown when they have un- 

 fledged young, they even betraying their charge into the hands of the 

 enemy by their too obvious solicitude, they then hovering directly over 

 the young and uttering their notes of distress. The young have a 

 fine,' wiry peep, inaudible beyond a few feet. They are very pretty 

 little creatures, covered with yellowish-buff colored down, with black 

 spots on the upper surface of the body. Even when first hatched, they 

 are quite lively and difficult to capture. 



About the middle of July the females suddenly disappear, and a 

 little later the males and young also leave, with the exception of a few 



