The red-necked phalarope is equally at home on land or water, and picks up its food on the sandy or muddy margins of the marshy pools it frequents in summer, and from the surface of the water, as it swims rapidly about, sitting high, and with head set back like a gull.
The nest is placed on the ground, among heather or herbage and grass, at some distance from the water. The four eggs are pale brown in ground-colour, spotted with blackish brown and grey.
Fig. 100.—Grey Phalarope. ¼ natural size.
The grey phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius), irregular in its visits like the last species, appears in larger numbers when it does come. Its visits to the south and south-east coasts of England occur in autumn and winter. Its range in summer is circumpolar, and it has been found breeding as far north as latitude 82° 30′. The breeding plumage is reddish chestnut, the female being brightest in colour. In winter, when it arrives in this country, its under parts are pure white, and the whole upper parts a delicate pale grey.
Woodcock.
Scolopax rusticula.
Fig. 101.—Woodcock. ⅙ natural size.
Upper plumage reddish brown barred and vermiculated with black; under parts wood-brown with darker brown bars. Length, fourteen inches. Sexes alike.