C. W. G. Eifrig (1905) found the red phalarope breeding very commonly around Cape Fullerton and Southampton Island, Hudson Bay. "They nest around fresh water ponds, laying their eggs, without nesting material, in depressions in the sand or moss, often in lichens." John Murdoch (1885), on the other hand, says, at Point Barrow, Alaska, that--
The nest is always in the grass, never in the black or mossy portions of the tundra, and usually in a pretty wet situation, though a nest was occasionally found high and dry, in a place where the nest of the pectoral sandpiper would be looked for. A favorite nesting site was a narrow grassy isthmus between two of the shallow ponds. The nest is a very slight affair of dried grass and always well concealed.
In the Kotzebue Sound region Joseph Grinnell (1900) found three nests, of which he says:
The nests were all on higher ground and at a distance of 100 yards or more from the lagoons where the birds usually congregated for feeding and social purposes. The three nests agreed in situation, being rather deep depressions sunk into the tops of mossy hummocks. There was a thin lining of dry grasses, and in one case the drooping blades from an adjoining clump of grass partially concealed the nest from view from above.
Miss Maud D. Haviland (1915) relates her experience with the nesting habits of this species, at the mouth of the Yenesei River, Siberia, as follows:
I found the first nest on Golchika Island early in July. My attention was called to it by the male bird, which flew round uneasily. Even when the nesting ground is invaded, this phalarope is very quiet and not very demonstrative. He flits round the intruder with a peculiar silent flight, rather like a big red moth, while he utters his chirruping alarm note--"_zhit zhit_." This call is shriller than that of _Phalaropus lobatus_, and quite recognizable where the two species breed side by side. I sat down on a log of driftwood, and in about half an hour was able to flush the bird from four fresh eggs. This nest, however, was not placed very well for photography, for about 50 yards away was a turf hut, which a Russian family had just taken possession of for the summer, and I dared not leave the hiding tent or apparatus near the spot. On the following day I was more fortunate, and found a nest which was also on the island but about half a verst away. It was in rather a dryer situation than the last, but like all the nests of this species that I saw, the eggs lay on quite a substantial platform of dead grass. In other cases the sites were so wet that the bird must have been sitting actually in water--and the photographer would have had to do likewise! In the photograph, the grass has been parted in order to show the eggs, but before this was done they were screened as carefully as the eggs of a redshank or reeve.