SNIPES, SANDPIPERS, ETC.: UPLAND PLOVER 263 
near Carlsbad, September 2, 1901 (Bailey); and on the salt flats west of the Guada¬ 
lupe Mountains September 2-4,1902 (Hollister). A single bird was seen in the upper 
part of the Playas Valley, August 20, 1908 (Goldman).—W. W. Cooke. 
Nest. —A slight depression, usually in bare ground, sometimes with a little grass 
lining, and at others with fine weed stems and a few feathers; generally hidden by 
surrounding vegetation. Eggs: 4, creamy buff or white, superficial spots snuff-brown 
and chocolate, deeper ones of violet and lilac, spots more numerous or confluent at 
larger end. 
Food. —The vegetable food comprises the seeds of such weed pests as button 
weed, fox-tail grass, and sand spurs; and the animal food, which amounts to practically 
97 per cent, is made up of chiefly injurious or neutral forms, including grasshoppers, 
crickets, click beetles, wire worms, cut worms, army worms, cotton worms, cotton- 
boll weevil, clover-leaf and clover-root weevils, and enemies of cow peas, sugar beets, 
grapevines, corn, wheat, barley and rye; also horse flies and their larvae, and cattle 
ticks. 
General Habits. —The great economic importance and rapidly 
decreasing numbers of the Upland Plover from uncontrolled cats and 
dogs, its tameness and slow breeding, the heavy grazing of the 
grassy plains, and unrestricted shooting make the Federal law protect¬ 
ing it at all seasons of prime importance. Not only in its northern 
summer home but in its winter range is it in danger. Formerly very 
abundant on the plains of Argentina, Doctor Wetmore has found it 
greatly reduced in numbers. Unfortunately, in Argentina it has replaced 
the Eskimo Curlew as a table delicacy, and is so eagerly sought by 
gunners that its preservation in settled regions is doubtful (1927a, pp. 
13-14). As Mr. Ligon well says: “True sportsmen, everywhere, should 
not only refrain from shooting Plovers, but should use their influence in 
preventing others from doing so. Under absolute protection they may 
be able to save themselves from the brink of extermination” (1927, 
p. 151). 
They are birds of peculiar attractiveness and interest, which we 
can ill afford to lose. Their delightful bubbling call, quip-ip-ip-ip, 
quip-ip-ip-ip, and their musical song, uttered as they pass high over 
head with the quick wing beats of their characteristic level flight; 
their gentle way of walking around inspecting you and demurring at 
your presence on their nesting grounds; their curious heron-like spearing 
gestures and their protective plumage, which Abbott Thayer considers 
one of the most highly specialized of grass patterns, all combine to 
make it a rare pleasure and privilege to study them. 
Like most members of the snipe family, Mr. Eaton says, this 
beautiful bird executes a peculiar musical monologue in the nesting 
season. It mounts high in the air, or alights on a knoll, “a fence, 
or even a tree and utters a prolonged mournful whistle, more like the 
wind than like a bird’s voice, which may be heard even in the night, 
and is one of the most weird and never to be forgotten sounds in 
