WILSON’S PLOVER. 
6i 
WILSON’S PLOVER. 
^GIALITIS WILSONIA. 
Char. Above, olive ash or pale ashy brown, tinged on the nape with 
rufous ; beneath, white ; forehead and collar on breast black ; tail dark 
olive ; bill black, long, and stout. Length about 7^ inches. Easily dis- 
tinguished from the other small “ ring-necked ” Plover by its large black 
bill. 
Nest. Amid the shingle on a sea-side beach ; an e.xtremely slight 
hollow in the sand, without lining. 
Eggs. Usually 3; pale olive-buff thickly marked with blackish brown ; 
size variable, average 1.30 X i.oo. 
This species was described by Ord in 1813, and dedicated to his 
friend Wilson. It is a Southern bird, and restricted probably to 
the sea-coast, though some few observers have reported finding it 
in the interior. It was “ not very common ” on Long Island in 
Giraud’s day, and later authorities have reported it extremely rare 
there; but it occurs in more or less abundance from New Jersey to 
Florida and on both coasts of Central America. A few examples 
have been credited to New England, and Colonel Goss shot one 
on Brier Island, at the mouth of the Bay of Fundy. 
Dr, Coues describes the habits of this Plover as much the same 
as those of its congener, the Semi-palmated. He says the Wil- 
son’s Plovers move north in flocks of six to twenty; but these sep- 
arate on the nesting ground, and two nests are never placed in 
close neighborhood. They are gentle and unsuspicious birds ; but 
when a nest is approached, the parents become intensely excited, 
flitting to and fro hurriedly and wildly, and continually uttering 
cries of alarm and dismay in most pathetic tones. Their note is 
described as “half a whistle and half a chirp, and very different 
from the clear mellow piping of the other species.” 
They begin to lay about the middle of May or first of June, 
according to location. The young run as soon as they are clear of 
the shell, and easily escape detection by squatting on the sand, 
which is very similar in color. 
The flight of Wilson’s Plover is swift and graceful ; and as the 
birds skim above the water — barely clearing the crests of the 
waves — they continually utter their cry in clear, soft tones. Giraud 
described them as of a sociable tendency; but Audubon thought 
they rarely mingled with other species, and called them solitary. 
Their food is small shell-fish, worms, and insects, with which they 
mingle fine particles of sand. 
