Shore-bird Shooting 421 



in May. The eggs are laid in the deserted nest 

 of some jay, crow, or thrush, and at a height of 

 from three to forty feet from the ground. 



WILLET 



(Symphemia semipalmata) 



Adult male and female in breeding plumage Upper parts, light 

 brownish gray ; head and neck, streaked with dusky ; back and 

 wing-coverts, spotted and barred with blackish ; under parts, 

 white, tinged with gray on the neck, with buff on the sides ; the 

 sides with the jugulum and breast, spotted and barred with 

 dusky ; upper tail-coverts, white ; tail, ash-gray, mottled with 

 darker; axillars and lining of wings, sooty black. 



Adidt male and female in winter plumage Upper parts, ash-gray ; 

 under parts, dull white. Neck, in front shaded with gray. 



Young Upper parts, brownish gray, the feathers margined with 

 buff; sides, tinged with the same color, and finely mottled with 

 gray ; bill, gray, dusky at its end ; iris, brown ; feet, gray blue ; 

 claws, black. 



Downy young Upper parts, brownish gray, spotted with dusky; 

 dusky lines on lores, and from eye to occiput and nape ; fore- 

 head, sides of head, and lower parts, dull white. 



Measurements Length, 15 inches; wing, 7.35 inches; culmen, 

 2. 20 inches ; tarsus, 2.30 inches ; tail, 2.90 inches. 



Eggs Four in number; color, light gray, with fine dottings of 

 dark bistre; measure 2 inches by 1.50 inches. 



Habitat Breeds on the Bahamas, and from Florida, north to New 

 Jersey, and irregularly to Massachusetts and Michigan (?). 

 Winters from Florida, rarely North Carolina, the Bahamas, and 

 West Indies, south to Brazil. Formerly recorded on the Atlan- 

 tic Coast, north to Newfoundland, but now, apparently, the 

 majority of birds taken in the fall on the Atlantic Coast north of 

 Virginia belong to the western subspecies. Has occurred in 

 Bermuda and Europe. 



One of our best-known shore-birds, now 

 separated into two forms, the eastern and the 



