77 



WILSON'S PLOVER. 

 CHARADRIUS WILSONIA. 

 [Plate LXXIIL— Fig. 5.] 



Peale's Museum, ^'o. 4159, male — MO, female. 



OF this neat and prettily marked species I can find no ac- 

 count, and have concluded that it has hitherto escaped the eye of 

 the naturalist. The bird of which the figure in the plate is a cor- 

 rect resemblance, was shot the thirteenth of May, 1813, on the 

 shore of Cape-Island, Newjersey, by my ever-regretted friend; and 

 I have honored it with his name. It was a male, and was accom- 

 panied by another of the same sex and a female, all of which were 

 fortunately obtained. 



This bird very much resembles the Ring Plover, except in 

 the length and color of the bill, its size, and in wanting the yel- 

 low eyelids. The males and females of this species differ in their 

 markings, but the Ring Plovers nearly agree. We conversed with 

 some gunners of Cape May, who asserted that they were acquaint- 

 ed with these birds, and that they sometimes made their appear- 

 ance in flocks of considerable numbers ; others had no knowledge 

 of them. That the species is rare we were well convinced, as we 

 had diligently explored the shore of a considerable part of Cape 

 May, in the vicinity of Great Egg-harbor, many times at different 

 seasons, and had never seen them before. How long they remain 

 on our coast, and where they winter, we are unable to say. From 

 the circumstance of the oviduct of the female being greatly en- 

 larged and containing an egg half grown, apparently within a 

 week of being ready for exclusion, we concluded that they breed 



VOL. IX. U 



