500 The Zoologist — November, ISGiU 



phalarope, and were in a very preUy slate of plumage intermediate between the summer 

 and winter dres'-. I noticed the same thin^ in these phal;nopes wiih respect to their 

 autumn change which I had observed in many other birds, and this is that ihe great 

 difference in plumage is effected not by the assumption of new feathers, but by the old 

 feathers receivini; new colouring matter. Thus, in the phalarope the di>linguishin<j 

 gray of ihe winter dress first shows itself at the base of the feather, and then extends 

 gradually outwards, driving befure it, as it were, the tints of the summer plumage. A 

 very pretty effect was thus produced in ihe appearance ol' the birds when half way 

 throu^ their change. Traces of the summer dress were still apparent in ihe rufous 

 edging of most of the feathers; while the season of the year was proclaimed by ihe 

 broad patches of pure gray which already marked the feathers on the back and 

 shoulders and crown of the head. One of ihe two birds I examined had the cheeks still 

 of the delicate rufous linge which characterizes the gray phalarope in ils summer dress. 

 Mr. Brodrick writes to me from Budleigh Salierlon that flnrks of this phalarope 

 appeared on the shin<.'ly beach at that place during the miiiiile of September. He 

 noticed that the birds were in a weak and emaciated state. One which was brought 

 to him had suffered iiself to be caught by the hand, to such a state of weakness had 

 starvation reduced it. It is a very unusual thing to find this phalarojie in any 

 numbers upon our coasts, even after severe weather; its occurrence, then, in Jloc/cs is 

 a circumstance worthy of special notice. It is not often that more than a single 

 example of the gray phalarope has been met with, or at ihe most a pair have been seen 

 together: I remen)ber, some years since, after a rough autumn gale, seeing as many 

 as six together on the sands of the River Taw, in North Devon, and at the lime con- 

 sidered that a very exceptional occurrence. — M. A. Mulhew ; Weslon-super-Mare, 

 October 9, 1866. 



Gray Phalarope and Black Tern in Devon and Cornwall. — The late severe gales 

 have driven an unusual number of gray phalardpes on the coasts of Devon and Corn- 

 wall. A few specimens of both old and young are lo be met with almost every 

 autumn on their return from the breeding-places; but within ihe last three weeks 

 more than a dozen have been obtained in the neighbourhood of Plymouth alone, and 

 some have been observed on inland ponds, swimming amcnig the tame ducks. All the 

 specimens examined by myself were much emaciated, and one specimen still retained 

 many of the red feathers on the breasl peculiar to ihe breeding season. The young of 

 the black tern, too, have been plentiful this season, which I anticipated would he the 

 case, considering ihe numbers of old birds which made their appearance on various 

 paris of the English coasts during the spring. — J. Gutcombe {PI i/ mo nth), in the 

 'Field' of September 20, 1866. 



Gray Phalarope in Dublin Bay. — From the 25ih to the end of September the gray 

 (why so called ?) phalarope was frequently met with in the Bay. I am sorry to record 

 five specimens shot: four were presented to me. In ils ocean wildness I had good 

 glimpses into the habits of the bird: its food I found lobe a species of sca-Iouse, 

 something like our wood-louse, which greedily preys on animal substances, as dead 

 floating birds, Ike, and is to be met with, with other species, amongst floating sea- 

 weed : the bird takes these both by swimming and by dropping on the water, also from 

 sea. weed and the tidal portion of the coast. It swims light as a cork, gull-fashion, and 

 incessantly keeps nodding the head ; it also dives after ils food for a distance of five or 

 si.x feet. The flight of the binl resembles that of the sand lark species. Of man it 



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