BIRDS 361 



RINGED PLOVER. 



^.Egialitis hiaticula (L. ). 



The Ringed Plover frequents our coasts all through the year, 

 and breeds numerously at Ravenglass and on Walney Island. 

 Some pairs nest on gravel beds on the rivers Esk, Eden, and 

 Irthing, occasionally on the salt marshes, and constantly, though 

 sparingly, on the whole coast-line from the Kent to the Grune, 

 where I saw four nests near together on the 28th of April. 

 The young begin to hatch between the middle and end of May. 

 In 1891 I caught a yellow-limbed youngster, feathering nicely, 

 on the 2d of July, at the south end of Walney, it having 

 started up at our feet as we crossed the beach. It was pen- 

 feathered, and could run amazingly. When stopped he lay 

 crouching in my hand without an effort to escape, his dark eyes 

 peering inquiringly at his captor. The old birds are generalfy 

 so demonstrative when they have eggs or young, that I was 

 amused by the quiet demeanour of a pair of these small Plovers, 

 observed at the Grune Point, May 30, 1891. For the first 

 twenty minutes they ran to and fro over the sands, calling 

 plaintively ; then one of them began to prune its feathers with 

 a nonchalant air, while its companion squatted down on the bare 

 sand very much as a Skylark might have done. Large flocks 

 of Ringed Plover frequent our estuaries until the end of May, 

 and many parties of immature birds arrive on our estuaries in 

 the month of September, feeding on the open sands and in 

 small pools left by the ebbing tide, especially between Silloth 

 and Maryport, Cardunock and Port Carlisle. On the 8th of 

 July 1890 I saw a small party of Ringed Plovers at Monkhill 

 Lough, but they are rarely seen in the interior of Lakeland, at 

 least apart from the rivers on which, as already pointed out, a 

 few pairs breed annually. 



LAPWING. 



Vanellus vulgaris, Bechst. 



If the Lapwing is less frequently met with in the accounts of 

 Lord William Howard than we should have expected, the 



