WATER BIRDS. 193 
and summer dress, but those which linger until June assume the nearly perfect breeding 
plumage. Autumn specimens are also more or less intermediate, but the winter plumage 
predominates. 
106. Lesser Yellowlegs. Totanus flavipes (Gmel.). (255) 
Synonyms: Yellowlegs, Summer Yellowlegs, Little Yellowlegs, Little Tell-tale, Yellow- 
shanks.—Scolopax flavipes, Gmel., 1789.—Gambetta flavipes, Bonap., 1856.—Totanus 
flavipes, Vieill., and authors generally. 
Known by its close resemblance to the preceding, and its smaller size. 
It has the same nearly straight bill, less than 14 inches long, also the same 
yellow legs, and the white rump slightly barred with black. 
Distribution.—America in general, breeding in the cold temperate and 
subarctic districts, and migrating south in winter to southern South Am- 
erica. Less common in western than in eastern North America. 
In Michigan this bird has practically the same habits and distribution 
as the Greater Yellowlegs, which it so closely resembles, and with which 
it is commonly found. Its notes are practically the same, its feeding 
habits identical, and it answers the whistle, comes to the decoys, and 
behaves in every way precisely like its larger relative. The main difference 
observable is that the Lesser Yellowlegs is commonly much more abundant 
than the Greater Yellowlegs, being seen frequently in flocks of 100 or 200 
individuals, while the Greater Yellowlegs is seen by dozens or scores. 
In many localities it lingers until the first or even the second week in 
June, and by the middle of July flocks begin to return from the north. 
Mr. Swales noted the first migrants at Detroit on July 9, 1905, and Mr. 
J. Claire Wood says they were back July 1, 1906. Our latest fall record 
at Lansing is October 28, 1906, when a flock of eleven was found wading 
and swimming in a pool near the College. 
Its nesting range seems to be precisely the same as for the Greater 
Yellowlegs, and like that species it has been found nesting in northern 
Illinois and in Wisconsin, but not in Michigan. The eggs are buff, distinctly 
spotted with dark brown and purplish gray, and average 1.73 by 1.14 
inches. 
Its food consists mainly of the smaller forms of animal life which abound 
in shallow waters, including large numbers of insects and insect larve. 
In Nebraska Professor Aughey found locusts in five stomachs taken in 
October 1874, as well as large numbers of other insects. 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Bill straight or very slightly curved upward, and nasal groove extending more than 
half way to tip. Colors of plumage, bill, and legs essentially the same as in the Greater 
Yellowlegs, the summer and winter dress varying also in the same way. 
Length 9.50 to 11 inches; wing 6.10 to 6.65; culmen 1.30 to 1.55; tarsus 2 to 2.15. 
107. Solitary Sandpiper. Helodromas solitarius solitarius (Wilson). (256) 
Synonyms: Big Sandpiper, Tip-up, Teeterer.—Tringa solitaria, Wils., 1813.—Totanus 
solitarius, Aud., 1839, Coues, 1872.—Rhyacophilus solitarius, Cass. in Baird, 1858.— 
Totanus chloropygias, Vieill., 1816, Nutt., 1834. 
Figure 565. 
Slightly larger than the common Tip-up or Spotted Sandpiper, for which 
it is likely to be mistaken; but it is always darker above (sometimes quite 
25 
