VOL. VIII.] 



NOTES. 



293 



were therefore comparatively newly laid. It is an interesting 

 fact that last year on the same lake (not large enough to hold 

 more than one pair of these birds) I found a nest of this 

 species (presumably the same pair) on April 1st, also containing 

 four much stained eggs. It is an early date and helps to 

 bear out the theory that individual birds of a species con- 

 sistently breed early, while others are probably equally 

 consistent in breeding late. In both the above cases, the nests 

 were in identically the same place. G. K. Baynes. 



[An instance of very early nesting has been recorded for 

 Renfrew, where a nest with five eggs was reported on March 

 13th, 1906 (A7m. Scot. N. H., 1907, p. 206).— Eds.] 



FEEDING HABIT OF THE RED-NECKED PHALAROPE. 



With reference to the notes on this subject {antea, pp. 243 

 and 268) the accompanying photograph of a Red-necked 

 Phalarope is of interest as it shows the bird turning roimd 



in the water and beating the surface with its wings, no doubt 

 to disturb the mud at the bottom and bring up insects hiding 

 there. In my book Through Birdland Byways, published 

 six years ago, I gave a description of this exercise and 

 mentioned that I thought it was a method of raising food 

 from the bottom of the shallow water. Mr. Richmond Paton 

 and I watched the birds doing this many times on our 



