Mr. A. Strickland on the British Wild Geese. 121 



XVI. — On the British Wild Geese. By Arthur Strick- 

 land, Esq.* 



[With a Plate.] 



Geese are a natural group of birds, possessing several strongly- 

 marked characters : they are aquatic birds, but live and feed 

 much upon dry land ; they feed in the day-time and rest at 

 night, whereas ducks rest in the day-time and feed at night. 

 They of all birds seem to undergo the least changes of colour in 

 their plumage, — the males, females, and young birds in winter and 

 summer being nearly alike, thus differing greatly from the duck 

 tribe. They have a character apparently peculiar to themselves, 

 — that of having in many cases the most perfect and delicate 

 colours of their bills and legs when young, and losing that deli- 

 cacy as they advance in age, thus entirely reversing the usual 

 order. Some of the British wild geese, which we have now to 

 consider, are so alike in plumage, that that important character 

 can hardly be taken as an element to assist in discriminating the 

 species, — the form and colour of their bills and legs, and the 

 habits of the birds in a state of nature, being all, apparently, that 

 we can safely rely upon. Besides this, they are the most diffi- 

 cult of all birds to study, the determined and persevering sports- 

 man only being able to approach them; the naturalist has but few, 

 and only casual, opportunities of examining them. From these 

 circumstances the authors of works on British birds seem to 

 have been satisfied to take matters as they found them, giving 

 themselves no trouble to examine carefully the characters of the 

 species they describe, and only giving the accounts of their ap- 

 pearance and disappearance, and habits, as mentioned by others, 

 and collecting the records of their having been met with in 

 various parts of the country. Mr. Gould has given us but 

 three British Geese — the White-fronted, the Grey-lag, and the 

 Bean Goose, thus including all that are not the first two above- 

 named species, under the mysterious and misused name of 

 Segetum, or Bean Goose. I will first make a few remarks on 

 these two. 



The Anas albifrons, or White-fronted Goose. — The white 

 band in front (which is seldom wanting), the plain flesh-coloured 

 bill, the conspicuous black patches on the breast, and the orange- 

 coloured legs will always mark this bird. It is not, and probably 

 never was, a regular migratory or abundant species in this coun- 

 try, but is occasionally found in hard weather, singly or in small 

 groups, frequenting river-sides or running streams, and I believe 



* Communicated by the author, having been read before the Natural 

 History Section of the British Association, at Leeds, September 24, 1858. 



