LITTLE EINGED PLOVER. 



^GIALiriS CURONICA (J. F. Gmelia). 



Charadriiis curonicus, /. F. Gmelin, Syst. Nat. i. p. 692 

 (1788). 



Charadrius minor, Nauru, vii. p. 225, xiii. p. 229; Macg. iv. 



p. 128 ; Heioitson, i. p. 299. 

 -^gialitis curonica, Yarr. ed. 4, iii. p. 262 ; Dresser, vii. 



p. 491. 



Petit Pluvier a collier, French ; Fluss-Reffenpfeiffer, 

 German ; Frailecillo, Atidarios chico, Spanish. 



This bird is a singularly rare visitor to England, 

 although common in many parts of the continent of 

 Europe and a regular summer migrant to the north- 

 eastern portions thereof. I have met with this Plover 

 on various parts of the shores of the Mediterranean, and 

 found it breeding in scattered pairs on the uncultivated 

 wastes of New Castile in the neighbourhood of Aranjuez. 

 Except in the matter of its preference for the sandy 

 banks of freshwater lakes, ponds, and streams, to the 

 sea-shore, this species differs but little in habits from 

 the common Ringed Plover, but it is considerably 

 smaller, and proportionately much more slenderly built 

 than that bird. The eggs of the present species, found 

 by us in Spain, were laid in slight depressions of the 



