The Wandering Tattler 
It is easy to picture a time when Willets were ten times more common 
than they are at present; and if only men will content themselves with 
honest beef and mutton, instead of hankering after strange and doubtful 
dainties, we may live to see such a time again. 
Taken in Santa Barbara 
A CAT-NAP 
Photo by the Author 
No. 249 
Wandering Tattler 
A. O. U. No. 259. Heteroscelus incanus (Gmelin). 
Description. —Adult in summer: Above uniform brownish slate (chaetura drab); 
a white superciliary, broken behind; shaft of first primary chiefly white; underparts 
white as to ground, everywhere marked with color of back (chaetura drab to hair-brown), 
most lightly on throat and crissum, in heavy streaks on fore-neck, in wavy bars on 
breast, sides, and flanks; axillaries and part of wing-lining pure drab. Bill greenish 
dusky; feet yellowish dusky. Adult in winter: Similar, but nowhere barred save 
on under tail-coverts and lining of wings; throat and belly white, the drab of remaining 
underparts confluent as solid shading. Immature: Like adult in winter, but scapulars, 
tertials, and upper tail-coverts, indistinctly spotted with white, and sides faintly mottled 
with white. Length about 279.4 (11.00); wing 176.7 (6.95); tail 76.2 (3.00); bill 39.4 
(i.55); tarsus 33 (1.30). 
Recognition Marks. —Killdeer size; uniform dark coloration distinctive; tew 
tew notes; frequents rocky shores. 
Nest and Eggs unknown. 
I2 74 
