270 
BIRDS OF NEW MEXICO 
of Yellow-legs—both Greater and Lesser—busied themselves picking 
them up. As they walked about, their large size, elongated bills, long 
slender necks and slender gray bodies distinguishing them, they moved 
their heads back and forth like doves, occasionally tipping a little and 
gleaning now from a ditch bank, now from a shallow, and now on the 
dried field where the silvery minnows shone in their bills. When 
approached they rose in flocks crying tu-weep , tu-weep , as they flew 
showing the white tail and rump, as they wheeled, the white of their 
sides, and as they circled in, the tern-like angular bend of the wing. 
And as they lit, for a moment they held their wings raised high over 
their backs in the beautiful recognition pose of birds with distinctive 
wing markings (19i0a, p. 161; and MS). 
In Alaska, Mr. Swarth saw them “ going through various courting 
antics, posing with upraised quivering wings, or running in circles on 
the sand bars, around the object of their attentions, and incessantly 
uttering the shrill whistle peculiar to the species” (1911a, p. 53). 
Additional Literature.—Nichols, J. T., and Francis Harper, Auk, XXXIII, 
248-250, 1916. 
YELLOW-LEGS: Totanus flavipes (Grnelin) 
Description. — Length: 9.5-11 inches, wing 6.1-6.6, bill 1.3-1.5, tarsus 2-2.1. 
Like the Greater \ ellow-legs in all plumages but smaller, bill proportionally smaller 
and more slender and legs relatively longer, markings on underparts less extensive, 
and without fine marbling on under surface of flight feathers. (See p. 269.) 
Range. —Breeds from Kotzebue Sound, upper Yukon Y r alley, northern Macken 
zie, northern Manitoba, and northern Quebec south to central Quebec (probably 
southern Manitoba), Saskatchewan, and southern Alberta; winters in West Indies, 
Ecuador, and southern South America over a wide area and about lakes up to 10,000 
feet; migrates mainly east of the Rocky Mountains. 
State Records. —The smaller Yellow-legs is much more common in New Mexico 
than the Greater, but nearly all the records refer to fall migration. A specimen was 
taken in the Guadalupe Mountains August 7, 1901 (Bailey); several were seen at 
Beaver Lake, August 26-27, 1908 (Birdseye); near Las Vegas August 31, 1903 
(Bailey),* near Koehler Junction August 21, 23, and 25, and September 6 and 12, 
1913 (Kalmbach); Apache, September 7 and 13, 1886 (Anthony); Zuni, Septem¬ 
ber 12, 1851 (Woodhouse); Mesilla, September 1, 1913 (Merrill); Carlsbad, Septem¬ 
ber 3-14, 1901 (Bailey); a large flock near Roswell as late as September 21, 1902 
(Gaut); and one bird at Albuquerque October 7, 1900 (?) (Birtwell). Woodhouse 
found Yellow-legs at both Albuquerque and Zuni the fall of 1S51 and Henry con¬ 
sidered them as one of the abundant migrants in August and September along the 
Rio Grande at Fort Thorn. [Between Socorro and Albuquerque in 1917, 12 were 
seen August 28,12 or more September 4, and at lakes four miles north of Albuquerque 
great numbers, September 3, 1920 (Ligon). Near Albuquerque on the frozen river 
in zero weather two were seen December 26, 1918 (Leopold).1 
Since the species is not rare at this season along the foothills of eastern Colorado, 
and was taken by Mearns April 14, 1892, at Lake Palomas on the New Mexico- 
Chihuahua line, it will undoubtedly be found at other places in eastern New Mexico. 
—W. W. Cooke. 
