82 CHAJtADRIIDiE. 



THE GREAT PLOVER. 



Norfolk Plover. 



(Edicnemus crepitans, Ternm.* 

 Charadrius cedicnemus, Linn. 



Is known only as an extremely rare visitant. 



The Great Plover is one of those species whose geographical dis- 

 tribution is very interesting. It is a regular summer visitant to 

 England, but common only in the eastern and south-eastern 

 counties, inclusive of Hampshire. Thence westward and north- 

 ward it becomes rare, and has not been noticed farther than 

 Yorkshire in the latter direction, t Consequently, we should 

 expect that very few would visit Ireland, and that these would 

 appear in the more southern rather than in the opposite portion 

 of the island. Such is the fact ; the few that have yet been 

 met with, having occurred from Dublin southward. 



Dr. J. D.Marshall, in the Magazine of Natural History (vol. ii. 

 p. 395), recorded a specimen, which was very much emaciated, 

 as having been shot at Clontarf, near Dublin, on the 27th Jan. 

 1829. The bird came under that gentleman's inspection just 

 after being killed. A very fine one (now preserved in the museum 

 of the Natural History Society of Dublin) was shot at Browns- 

 town, near Tramore, county of Waterford, about the 1st of March, 

 1840. It is stated, in the "Eauna of Cork," p. 11, that 

 " Richard D. Parker, Esq. (of Sunday's Well, Cork) met with 

 two of these ' large solitary plover' on the wild mountains of 

 Iveragh, county of Kerry, in August 1842. He had full oppor- 

 tunity of observing them, and remarked that they seemed fond 



* In Smith's History of Cork the following note appears : — " The stone curlew 

 {(Edicnemus). — Its feathers and feet resemble those of a bustard, and its cry is some- 

 thing like that of a green plover : we have it on our shores." In Tighe's 

 History of the County of Kilkenny, it is remarked, that "the Charadrius cedicnemus 

 frequents the lower part of Waterford harbour ; this bird, sometimes called the Nor- 

 folk plover, and sometimes stone curlew, is rather scarce," (p. 156.) The bird referred 

 to in these extracts, can hardly be considered the (E. crepitans. 



f Yarrell, Brit. Birds, vol. ii. p. 437. 



