The Heron-like Birds. 
191 
THE GREY 
PHALAROPE. 
(Crymnphilus 
fulicarius.) 
The Phalaropes 
are peculiar little 
birds and are re- 
markable for their 
lobed toes, and for 
the serrated ridge on the hinder aspect 
of the tarsus, in both of which characters 
they resemble the Grebes. In the Grey 
Phalarope, which, it should be remarked, 
is only grey in winter and is rufous in 
summer, the bill is short and does not 
exceed the tarsus in length ; it is some- 
what flattened and slightly widened at 
the end. It is an inhabitant of the 
Arctic Regions of both Hemispheres, 
and only visits Great Britain on migration, but occurs sometimes in large numbers. 
In winter it has been found as far south as the coasts of Chile, the Indian 
Ocean, and even in the New Zealand seas. The female is a larger bird than 
the male and does all the courting, the male being left to hatch out the eggs. 
The nest is a depression in the ground, scantily lined with dry leaves, and the 
eggs are four in number, very much pointed, and of a dark clay-brown or 
chocolate, sometimes tinged with olive, and marked with dark brown or blackish 
spots, and grey underlying spots. They measure about one-and-three-sixteenths 
to one-and-three-eighths of an inch in length. 
The bill 
The Grey Phalarope. 
THE 
RED-NECKED 
PHALAROPE. 
(Phalaropus 
liyperboreus.) 
is longer in 
this species, 
and tapers 
to a point, 
while the 
tarsus exceeds the length of 
the middle toe and claw. 
The colour also is different 
from that of the Grey Phala- 
rope, being slaty-grey above, 
including the head and hind- 
neck, with the lower throat 
bright rufous, as well as the 
sides of the neck. The Red- 
necked Phalarope nests in 
the Orkney and Shetland 
The Red-necked Phalarope. 
