8TEEPSILA8. 



413 



Tringa virgata. -^ 



Trin a borealis I ^^^^^^> ^y^^' ^^^- ^- P- ^^^ (1788). 



Aphriza townsendij Audubon, Syn. Birds N. Amer. p. 326 (1839). 

 Charadrius winterfeldti, Tschudi, Wiegm. Arch. f. Naturg. 1843, p. 388. 

 Aphriza virgata [Gmel.), Gray, Genera of Birds, iii. p. 548 (1846). 

 Strepsilas borealis {Gmel.), Gay, Hist. Chile, Zool. i. p. 408 (1847). 

 Aphriza borealis {Gmel.), Bonap. Compt. Bend, xliii. p. 420 (1856). 

 Strepsilas virgata {Gmel.), Schlegel, Mus. Pays-Bas, Cmsores, p. 45 (1865). 



Synonymy. 



Plates. — Gray, Genera of Birds, iii. pi. cxlvii. ; Audubon, Birds Am. v. pi. 322. 

 Habits. — Nelson, Cruise of the ' Corwin,' p. 83. 

 Eggs. — Unknown. 



Literature. 



The Surf-bird or Plover-billed Turnstone may be recognized either by its brown lower 

 back, or by its bill with a terminal vault, like that of a Plover. 



It is not known where the Plover-billed Turnstone breeds, but it has occurred in 

 various localities on the Pacific coast of America : — Norton Sound (lat. 63°) and Sitka 

 (lat. 57°), in Alaska; Vancouver Island and the coast of British Columbia; California; 

 Peru, Bolivia, and Chili. It may almost be taken for granted that it breeds in the two 

 first-named localities, and winters in the three last named. 



The alleged occurrence of the Surf-bird " on the Sandwich Islands, and others of the 

 Pacific Ocean " (Baird, Brewer, & Ridgway, Water-Birds N. Amer. i. p. 127), is probably 

 a myth. Latham originally described the species from " Sandwich Sound " and " King 

 George's Sound" (Lath. Gen. Syn. Birds, iii. pt. i. pp. 180, 181) under the names of 

 " Streaked Sandpiper" (summer plumage) and " Boreal Sandpiper" (winter plumage). The 

 next bird but one described in Latham's 'General Synopsis ' is also said to inhabit King 

 George's Sound, and is called the "Variegated Sandpiper." Three years later, in 1788, 

 Gmelin named these birds respectively Tringa virgata, T. borealis, and T. variegata. 

 These names were adopted by our English ornithologist in 1790 (Latham, Index Orn. ii. 

 p. 735), but the locality of the latter is altered from "Inhabits King George's Sound" to 

 " Habitat in sinu Nootka." It is therefore not unreasonable to infer that Sandwich 

 Sound and King George's Sound are parts of Nootka Sound, which separates the island of 

 Nootka from Vancouver Island, where the Surf-bird was found by John Keast Lord (' The 

 Naturalist in Vancouver Island and British Columbia,' ii. p. 298), and by Robert Brown 

 (Ibis, 1868, p. 424), as well as by Capt. Prevost (Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1859, p. 236) 

 and other travellers. The fact that Latham called the bird from King George's Sound 

 the " Boreal Sandpiper " is corroborative evidence in favour of a northern locality. 



Specific 

 characters. 



Geographi- 

 cal distribu- 

 tion. 



Alleged oc- 

 currence on 

 the Sand- 

 wichlslands. 



