168 MICHIGAN BIRD LIFE. 
the second set, numbering two or three, are often deposited in a depression 
scratched in the ground, as at first, but with no sign of any lining. Ac- 
cidents of this kind cause the second set of eggs to be deposited sometimes 
as late as the last of June (Nelson). These notes relate to northeastern 
Illinois, where in suitable places the species is actually abundant, not 
exceeded in numbers, says Mr. Nelson, by even the ever-present Spotted 
Sandpiper. 
Wilson’s Phalarope is far from common in Michigan. Dr. Gibbs and 
two companions shot five in Kalamazoo county from a flock of fifteen or 
twenty, May 21, 1878, and Dr. Gibbs states that another man shot a single 
specimen September 8 of the same year. There is a specimen in the collec- 
tion of C. J. Davis, Lansing, taken at Chandler’s Marsh, Ingham county, 
probably about 1892 or 1893, and T. L. Hankinson took a pair at Chandler’s 
Marsh June 21, 1897, and was sure they were breeding. Mr. Saunders 
records one killed at Mitchell’s Bay, St. Clair Flats in May 1882 (MclIlwraith, 
Birds of Ont., 1894, 128); and J. Claire Wood (letter, July 28, 1905) says 
“Tn June, 1900, my brother saw one specimen at St. Clair Flats, and Jesse 
Craven saw a pair there under circumstances that convinced him they 
were breeding.” May 9, 1906 Mr. J. Claire Wood saw a pair of these 
phalaropes in Ecorse township, Wayne County, and on May 12, Mr. P A. 
Taverner took a female in full plumage near the same place (Auk, XXIII, 
1906, 335). Mr. A. B. Covert records the taking of a male and female on 
the Huron River, near Ann Arbor, April 19, 1887 (Marginal note Coues 
Key). The same collector has also recorded a nest with both parent birds 
secured at Portage Lake, 26 miles north of Ann Arbor, July 2, 1875 (Forest 
& Stream, VI, 25, 402). Mr. Stewart E. White says it is uncommon at 
Grand Rapids (MS. List 1885). It is also included in Kneeland’s List of 
the Birds of Keweenaw Point, 1859, a doubtful record. 
The above records indicate that although the species is widely distributed 
in Michigan it is nowhere common. The eggs are described as cream buff 
or grayish buff, heavily spotted with dark brown or black; they average 
1.28 by .90 inches. 
The food of all the phalaropes seems to consist entirely of animal forms, 
and mainly of minute mollusca, crustacea, and aquatic insects. The present 
species, however, does not confine itself to aquatic forms, but eats a great 
variety of insects, including many terrestrial species. 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Bill decidedly longer than the head, very slender, almost cylindrical; legs slender, toes 
slightly webbed at base, with a narrow marginal web along each toe, but without scallops 
or lobes. Adult female in summer: Entire top of head bluish-gray, whitening on the 
nape and hind neck and becoming darker blue-gray on the middle of the back; a black 
stripe through the eye, expanding into a large black patch on the side of the neck and 
continued as a broad chestnut stripe along the side of the neck to the middle of the back; 
chin and upper throat white, as also the breast and the belly; the middle of the throat 
more or less washed with rufous and pale chestnut; sides and flanks grayish; rump and 
upper tail-coverts white, sometimes buffy tinted; wings brownish gray, the outer primaries 
with white shafts; tail-feathers largely white, broadly matened with gray. The adult 
male in summer is smaller and much less conspicuous, lacking almost entirely the strongly 
contrasted pearl-gray, chestnut, and black, and being simply grayish above and white 
below. In any plumage, however, the bird is recognizable by the details of bill and feet. 
Length of female 9.40 to 10 inches; wing 5.20 to 5.30; culmen 1.30 to 1.35; tarsus 1.30 to 
mee Length of adult male 8.25 to 9 inches; wing 4.75 to 4.80; culmen 1.25; tarsus 1.20 
to 1.25. 
