216 MICHIGAN BIRD LIFE. 
tail grayish brown; primaries blackish on the outer webs and at tips, but with white shafts; 
outer pair of tail-feathers entirely white, next two or three pairs white at base and tip, 
with a blackish sub-terminal bar, middle feathers like the back, but blackening at tip. Bill 
black at tip, orange at base; legs yellowish. Female: Similar, but most of the black 
areas duller or browner. In winter plumage all the black is replaced by grayish brown, 
but this is darker than the remaining areas, so that the pattern of coloration is similar. 
Length 6.50 to 7.50 inches; wing 4.65 to 5; culmen .48 to .55; tarsus .95 to 1.05. 
118. Piping Plover. A®gialitis meloda (Ord). (277) 
Synonyms: Pale Ring-neck, White Ring-neck, Belted Piping Plover, Western Piping 
Plover.—Charadrius melodus, Ord., 1824, Bonap., Nutt., Aud.—Aegialitis melodus, Cass., 
Baird, Coues, Ridgw.—Aegialites melodus circumcinctus, Ridgw., 1881. 
With a close general resemblance to the Ring-necked Plover, this bird 
may be known at once by the pale brownish gray tint of the upper parts 
and the black or dark collar which sometimes completely encircles the neck 
(var. circumcincta), but usually is broken in front (typical meloda). 
Distribution.—Eastern North America. Breeds locally from southern 
Saskatchewan, southern Ontario, Magdalen Islands and Nova Scotia 
south to Central Nebraska, northwestern Indiana, Lake Erie, New Jersey 
and Virginia. ; 
This little plover is found everywhere along the shores of the Great Lakes 
during summer, and probably breeds wherever conditions are suitable. 
In 1874 Ridgway described a variety of this species which he named 
circumcincta, in which the black collar was continuous across the chest 
instead of being interrupted there by white as in the common form. This 
new variety was said to be “chiefly restricted to the Missouri River region,” 
but was found later to occur more or less regularly throughout the Great 
Lake Region and less often in the eastern states. The form was recognized 
by the American Ornithologists’ Union, under the name A‘gialitis meloda 
circumcincta, the Belted Piping Plover, and has figured as a distinct sub- 
species for the last thirty years. Recently, however, sufficient evidence 
has accumulated to make it clear that the two supposed forms intergrade 
completely and occupy practically the same territory, so that the belted 
form is no longer considered a distinct sub-species and the last check-list 
of the American Ornithologists’ Union (1910) recognizes only the Piping 
Plover, as above. 
The typical form (meloda) is common along the north shore of Lake 
Erie, and has been found breeding in some numbers at Point Pelee, near 
the western end of that lake (Birds of Ontario, 1894, 165). According to 
Covert it is fairly common during migrations in Monroe county, and nests 
at the Monroe Marshes (probably along the beach of Lake Erie). The 
writer found two specimens on Little Traverse Bay, Emmet county. early in 
July, 1904, and a female, evidently with eggs or young, was found on Big 
Beaver Island, Lake Michigan, afew days later. We have records of the so- 
called Belted Piping Plover (supported by specimens) from Ottawa county, 
April 23 and 24, 1897, and April 25, 1896, and there are records for the Indi- 
ana shore of Lake Michigan, and for the Illinois and Wisconsin shores of the 
same lake. We have also a typical specimen taken at Port Sanilac on the 
Huron shore, April 15, 1897, by W. A. Oldfield. According to Nelson ‘It is 
a very common summer resident along the lake shore [of Lake Michigan in 
Illinois], breeding on the flat pebbly beach between the sand dunes and 
shore. Arrives the middle of April and proceeds at once to breeding. Some 
thirty pairs were breeding along the beach at this place (Waukegan) April 
