July, 1912 NOTES ON WADING BIRDS OF BARR LAKE REGION, COLORADO 
123 
from the shore line on a small island and was upon thorong'hly dry ground. The 
nest was discovered through the tell-tale actions of the parent. 
That the nests are wonderfully well concealed both through the protective col- 
oration of the eggs and through the cunning of the parent birds is beyond question ; 
yet this alone would hardly explain our lack of success in finding these nests, for 
had the birds been actually nesting in the numbers their relative abundance would 
seem to indicate, it would hardly have been possible for us to fail in our search 
so consistently. The suggestion was offered that while the birds were quite 
abundant each year, possibly only a small proportion of them were breeding birds, 
and that the non-breeders joined the breeding birds in a demonstration when the 
intruder approached the nesting site. The fact that throughout the nesting sea- 
son Phalaropes were seen in flocks of various sizes would seem to support this 
theory. 
Recurvirostra americana. Avocet. 
Among the most interesting experiences during the Barr lake work was 
our study of the nesting 
Avocets. The birds first 
made their appearance the 
last week in April (1907) 
and on account of their size 
and conspicuous coloring they 
were easy to keep track of. 
We kept a sharp lookout for 
their nesting site throughout 
May and June, and finally 
decided that they must be 
breeding on a small island far 
out in the big lake. A trip 
to the island on June 30, failed 
to reveal any nests although 
the birds showed every evi- 
dence of having ne.sts nearby. 
On July 4. 1907, we visited 
the island again and as we 
landed, a female Avocet flew 
up about twenty-five yards 
back from shore and upon 
walking directly to this spot 
we found a nest containing 
four eggs. About twenty 
yards from this point we p. nesting site of avocet on island 
found a second and thirty 
yards farther on a third, each containing four incubated eggs. 
The nests were all located in very similar locations, among a young growth 
of cockle-burrs not over six inches in height and which had probably grown at 
least half of that since the eggs were laid. The cockle-burrs formed a belt about 
ten yards wide clear around the, island just below the dense blue-stem and other 
rank grass with which the island was covered and on ground that was under water 
during the high water of the spring although inundated for a short time only. Two 
of the nests were very crude affairs, being a mere shallow hollow in the sand with 
a very few dead weed stalks of short lengths arranged around the eggs. The 
