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WATER OUZEL S NEST 

 {Photographed for the NlDlMLu..lSi near Pueblo, Colo., by H. W. Nash.) 



I la\' Still for about ten minutes more, and 

 then quickly started up and ran to where I had 

 seen her last. I took both the birds by sur- 

 prise, and had got within thirty feet of the fe- 

 male before she arose and began screaming. 

 Upon arriving at the spot where she arose 

 from I saw — four young birds! and the frag- 

 ments of the shells. These young Curlews were 

 not out of the eggs longer than from two to six 

 hours, as they could not yet stand on their feet, 

 and it is a well-known fact that all birds of this 

 genus leave the nest soon after hatching. 



Omaha, Neb. Isador S. Trostler. 



( To be continued!) 



Wilson's Phalarope. 



THIS exquisite member of the " Plover- 

 Snipe group " is comparatively common 

 in this region, frequenting the shores of 

 Devil's Lake and the many sloughs and 

 marshes of the prairies. Its gentle, confiding 

 character, its faintly-sounded, plaintive note, 

 and its tasteful dress, all appeal to the heart 

 and eye of the bird-lover. 



It was my good fortune this season to take a 

 set of the eggs of this bird each day for four 

 consecutive days ir. the middle of June, and in 

 each case the eggs numbered four and were 

 fresh. Three of the nests were com])osed sim- 

 ply of dried grasses neatly arranged in the 



slightest depression in wet, oozy ground bor- 

 dering marshy sloughs, and shaped like the 

 slightly hollowed palm of the hand. But tor 

 the grass lining the eggs must have been wet. 

 They lay with small ends to the center in true 

 Sandijiper style, and presented a very pretty 

 picture. 



'I'he fourth nest was located in short green grass 

 fringing the bare, muddy sliore of a small lake. 

 The grass was of the variety which looks like 

 bullrush in miniature. There was absolutely 

 no attempt at nest-building, the short vegetation 

 being simply pressed away from the center and 

 the eggs arranged in the usual manner. 



In the four sets the dimensions of the eggs 

 ranged from 1.20 to 1.31 long by .87 to .90 

 broad. The coloring and markings were fairly 

 uniform throughout, the ground being light 

 clay very thickly sprinkled with fine specks, 

 spots, and bold blotches of very dark umber- 

 brown verging upon black, and increasing in 

 number and size toward the larger end. In one 

 set the specks and spots were somewhat smaller, 

 but atoned in number, so that the ground color 

 was equally obscured. The elongate pyriforin 

 shape, as well as the thicker, heavier, and 

 darker coloring, seem to distinguish the eggs 

 of this bird from those of the Spotted Sand- 

 piper, the nest of which I have taken in same 

 vicinities. 



In [uly I made an unsuccessful search for 

 a nest in a locality which I had previously 



