THE BIRDS OF NEW JERSEY. 89 



few brown feathers on the body or in the wings; female, 

 reddish brown above, with a tinge of blue on the shoul- 

 ders and rump; below, dull white, streaked with dusky 

 on the throat, breast and sides. Males in fall and winter 

 resemble the females, but the bases to all the feathers are 

 blue. Young birds of both sexes resemble the female for 

 the first year, but are much more suffused with rusty. 



The nest is very compact and cleverly hidden in the 

 crotch of a bush near the ground; it is made of grasses, 

 leaves and bark, lined with hair and fine grasses. The 

 eggs are three or four in number, of a pale bluish white, 

 three-fourths of an inch by half an inch in size. It 

 breeds in the eastern United States as far north as Can- 

 ada and in the winter migrates to South America. It 

 appears in New Jersey shortly after the first of May and 

 leaves about the first of October. 



Its song, which lasts until late in August, when most 

 birds are silent, is strong but shrill, sounding something 

 hke che-che-che-chay. 



It feeds on the ground on small grasses and herbs. 



^ack Curlew. See Hudsonian Curlew. 



•far. See Night Hawk. 



tfay^ Blue. See Bluejay. 



Jttree. See Chewink. 



Junco. See Snowbird. 



Killdeer^ or Killdeer Plover, — Length, ten inches; 

 extent, twenty inches. The bill, three-fourths of an inch 

 in length, is black; above, grayish brown, a white and 

 black collar on hind neck; rump, rusty; wings, dusky, with 

 white shaft streaks on the long feathers near their tips 

 and a white bar across the middle of the wing; center tail 

 feathers gray, others rusty, terminal half crossed by a 



