714 REPORT OF STATE GEOLOGIST. 



black. Adult in Winter, and Immature. Above, plain ashy-gray,, 

 with dark shaft-lines, with or .without red or black traces; below,, 

 white; little or no trace of black on the belly; jugulum, with a few 

 dusky streaks and an ashy suffusion. 



Length, 7.60^8.75; wing, 4.60-4.95; bill, 1.40-1.75; tarsus, 1.00-1.15. 



RANGE. North America in general; breeds in Alaska and Arctic 

 regions and eastern Asia. Winters from Gulf coast south; except 

 about Great Lakes, rare in the interior. 



Nest, a depression in ground lined with grass or leaves. Eggs, 3-4; 

 brownish-grayish or olive buff, blotched, spotted and stained with 

 chestnut-brown; 1.43 by 1.01. 



Migrant the latter part of May, early in June and October. Some- 

 times abundant about the lower end of Lake Michigan and the small 

 lakes near there, in full breeding plumage, in May; elsewhere rare. 



Mr. Geo. F. Clingman obtained a specimen of this bird from the 

 shore of Lake Michigan, in Lake County, June 1, 1879 (Coale). Mr. 

 C. A. Tallman informs me, he has taken it at Wolf Lake, in Indiana. 



The earliest record I have is from Mr. E. Blackwelder, who took it 

 in Cook County May 18, 1895. Mr. Tallman took it in the same 

 county May 23 and 30, 1896. May 25, 1887, in company with Mr. H. 

 K. Coale, I found it very abundant, in full plumage, between Grand 

 Crossing, 111., and the Indiana line, and took several specimens. 



Mr. F. L. Washburn obtained it at Ann Arbor, Mich., May 14. 1888. 

 Mr. Nelson notes its occurrence as late as June 5, and in the fall says 

 it returns in winter dress during September, and remains well into 

 October (Birds of Northeastern Illinois, pp. 127, 128). It does not 

 seem to be as plentiful in fall. Mr. Tallman informs me of taking two 

 specimens at Calumet Lake in October and one at Mud Lake October 

 12, 1893. 



In Alaska it breeds abundantly at the mouth of the Yukon, on the 

 shores of Norton's Sound and at Point Barrow, where they arrive from 

 the 10th to the end of May. They nest from the first of June to the 

 first of July. The young are mostly on the wing toward the end of 

 the latter month, and the birds begin to gather into flocks along the 

 muddy edges of the brackish pools and banks of tide creeks. They 

 leave in October (Nelson, N. H. Coll. in Alaska, pp. 110, 111). 



