602 
SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS. —LIMICOLJE. 
thickly marked all over with blackish-browTi in irregular sharply-defined spots, splashes and 
fine dots. Note low, piping, and rather plaintive. 
586. 2Ei. semipalma'tus. (Lat. semi, half ; palmatiis, palmated : the species is remarkably distin- 
guished by the extent of the half-webbing between the toes.) Semipalmated Plover. 
Ring Plover. Ring-neck. ^ 9 ; adult : Upper parts uniform dark ashy-gray (wet-sand 
color) ; under parts pure white. A broad black ring encircling the neck. In advance of this 
a white half-collar around back of neck, spreading into the white of the throat. A white 
frontal bar, entirely surrounded by black : i. e. a black coronal bar and black stripe along lore 
and side of head, meeting its fellow over base of upper mandible. Primaries blackish, with 
narrow white spaces reduced to a portion of the shaft alone on the outer primary ; secondaries 
largely white, and greater coverts white-tipped ; tertiaries like the back. Tail like back, 
the feathers insensibly blackening toward their ends, most of them white-tipped, the outer- 
most nearly all white. An orange ring round eye, very bright. Bill black, with orange base ; 
legs yellowish. Web between outer and middle toe reaching to end of the second joint of the 
latter. Length about 7.00 ; extent 15.00-15.50 ; wing 4.75-5.00 ; tail 2.25, rounded ; bill 0.50 ; 
tarsus 0.90 ; middle toe and claw the same. Young : No black coronal bar, the white of fore- 
head reaching bill and eyes, and prolonged over the latter; neck-ring and loral stripe gray, 
not black ; bill mostly black. Upper parts with slight whitish or rusty edging of the feathers. 
Chick : Upper parts mottled with gray, black, and brown, in no special pattern. Collar round 
neck and under parts white. N. Am. at large, the most abundant and generally diffused of the 
ring-necks, especially plentiful in flocks on the beaches late in the summer and early autumn. 
Breeds northward ; eggs 2 to 4, like the kildeer's ; only, of course, distinguishable by much 
smaller size : length 1.20 to 1.40, by 0.90 to 0.95 in breadth. 
587. melo'dus. (Lat. meZocZws, melodious.) Piping Plover. Pale Ring-neck. ^, adult.' 
Above, very pale ash, lighter than any other N. A. species. A white half-collar round back of 
neck. A black ring behind this, tending to encircle the neck ; but I have seldom seen it com- 
plete on the cervix, and as a matter of fact it is seldom complete on the fore-neck either; ordi- 
narily a link only on each side of the neck. A black coronal bar from one eye to the other. 
Forehead, sides of head, and entire under parts snowy-white, excepting the black on sides of 
neck, there being no dark bars on lores or sides of head. Primaries dusky, with large white spaces, 
their shafts white for a corresponding extent. Secondaries and greater coverts mostly white ; 
long tertiaries like back. Upper tail-coverts and bases of tail-feathers white ; the latter black- 
ening towards their ends, the outer pair or two entirely white. A colored ring round eye. Bill 
yellow, the end beyond the nasal fossae black — very obtuse and short and stout for its length. 
Web between outer and middle toe not reaching to end of the basal joint of the latter. Rather 
smaller than the last; wing 4.50-4.75 ; tail 2.00-2.25 ; bill under 0.50; tarsus 0.87 ; middle 
toe and claw 0.75. 9 ? adult : The coronal bar reduced to a trace, dark brown ; the ringing of 
neck reduced to a dusky-gray spot on each side. Young: Resembling 9 as just said, but no 
trace of dark color on head and little if any on sides of neck. A very pretty little species, with 
its pale dry-sand colored upper parts and stumpy bill ; perfectly distinct from the last, with which 
it is often associated. U. S. and British Provinces, E. of the R. Mts. (beyond which appar- 
ently replaced by A. nivosus) ; abundant along the Atlantic coast of the U. S., breeding N. to the 
St. Lawrence, wintering from the Carolinas southward. Eggs laid preferably on the shingle of 
the beach, while the semipalmated usually goes to some grassy or mossy spot back of the sand. 
Eggs pretty certainly distinguishable from those of the other ring-neck by their lighter color- 
ing — there is much the same diff'erence in tone that there is between the birds themselves; 
clay-color or palest creamy-brown, sparsely and pretty uniformly marked with blackish-brown 
specks, without spots of any size, or scratchy lines, sometimes mere points ; eggs of about same 
capacity as the ring-neck's, but rather less elongate and pointed ; 1.20 to 1.30 X 0.95 to 1.00. 
588. m. circumcinc'tus 'l (Lat. circumcinctus, bound about.) Belted Piping Plover. A 
