642 
SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS. — LIMICOL^. 
wings ; on the scapulars and long inner secondaries the black resolved in regular angular bars 
on a greenish-brown field. Kump and most upper tail-coverts brownish-black, unvaried ; a 
few of the longer coverts barred to correspond with tail. Middle tail-feathers dark ashy- 
brown, with paler or rufescent edges, and irregular or broken bars, throughout ; other tail- 
feathers becoming orange-brown, with numerous irregular or broken bars or spots of black ; 
with one broad, firm, subterminal black bar, and tips white for a distance increasing on succes- 
sive feathers. Under parts dull soiled white, or tawny-white, the rufescence strongest on 
jugulum and breast, the jugulum streaked with blackish, and sides with sharp arrow-heads 
of the same. Axillars and lining of wings pure white, regularly barred with black. Prim- 
aries brownish-black; the 1st at least, and sometimes all of them, barred with white on the 
inner webs ; shaft of the first white, of the others brown. Secondaries like primaries, but 
usually barred with white on both webs, the inner ones gradually assimilating with the back 
in character of markings. Bill yellow, with black ridge and tip ; feet dull yellowish, drying 
darker; iris dark browm. Length 11.75-12.75 ; extent 21.50-23.00; wing 6.25-7.00; tail 
about 3.50; tarsus 1.75; bill, and middle toe and claw 1.00-1.25. Downy young: Varie- 
gated above with white, brown, or black ; white below ; bill bluish with dark tip ; legs clay- 
color. They are 5 or 6 inches long before any feathers sprout. N. Am. at large, rare W. of 
the R. Mts., in profusion on the prairies of the interior, and common eastward; N. to the 
Yukon. Breeds from the middle districts northward ; winters extralimital. A fine game 
bird ; but those who only know it when its fears are excited by incessant persecution have 
little idea what a gentle and confiding creature it is on the western prairies. Nest any- 
where on the prairie, in June; eggs normally 4, averaging 1.75 X 1.28; clay-color or pale 
creamy-brown without olive shade ; spotted all over, but most thickly at the large end, with 
small, sharp, rounded surface marks of umber-brown, among which are the purplish-gray shell- 
spots ; the spots rarely if ever larger than a split pea, and seldom confluent. 
249. TRYN'GITES. (Gr. rpvyyas, truggas, a sandpiper, with suffix -r?;?, -tes.) Marble- WING 
Sandpipers. Bill shorter than head, very slender, tapering, and acute, grooved nearly its 
w^iole length, and thus much as in Tringa ; but gape of mouth extensive, and end of bill not 
dilated and sensitive. Frontal feathers embracing base of upper mandible in nearly transverse 
outline, and extending quite to nostrils ; those on side of under mandible reachipg further still, 
and those of chin completely filling the interramal space ; such extension of the feathers 
making the bill appear remarkably short. Wings of ordinary shape. Tail about one-half 
as long as wdngs, rounded, with projecting central feathers. Tibiae denuded below for a 
space less than length of middle toe. Tarsus longer than middle toe and claw. Toes cleft to 
the base, or with only the most rudimentary basal webbing. Primaries peculiarly marbled in 
color. Tail not barred. Related to Tringa in many respects ; but the acute and hardened 
tip of the bill, and long gape, are totanine, and on the whole the affinities seem to be with 
the last genus. One species. 
641. T. rufes'cens. (Lat. rufescens, rufescent, reddish. Fig. 449.) Buff-breasted Sandpiper. 
^ 9 J adult, in breeding plumage : Above, brownish- 
black with a greenish gloss, every feather broadly mar- 
gined with tawny or yellowish-brown, the latter the 
prevailing tone. Under parts buff or fawn-colored, with- 
out markings except a few small blackish spots on sides 
of breast. Central tail-feathers greenish-brown, blacken- 
ing at ends ; others paler, often rufescent, with white or 
Fig. 449. — Buff-breasted Sandpiper, tawny tips and subterminal black bar; and usually, also, 
nat. size. (Adnat. del. E. C.) some black marbling or streaking. Primaries and sec- 
ondaries ashy-brown blackening at end, the extreme tip white — most of the inner webs 
of the primaries, and both webs of the secondaries pearly white, speckled and marbled witk 
