LOCAL FAUNA 



American Scoter and Ring-necked Duck. — In a recent revision 

 of the mounted specimens of the birds of South Carolina, inci- 

 dent upon the printing of labels for the Museum's local bird ex- 

 hibit, several corrections have been found necessary, two of these 

 entailing changes of some importance in the records of the avi- 

 fauna of the state. 



Of two specimens labelled Surf Scoter, Oidemia perspicillata 

 (Lam.), I noticed the female^ to differ from the male in that the 

 feathering on the bill did not extend any farther forward on the 

 forehead than on the lores, whereas it is characteristic of both 

 male and female in 0. perspicillata to have the feathering of the 

 forehead run forward on the culmen beyond that of the lores> 

 to the nostril. Careful examination has proved that the female 

 of these specimens is really a female Oidemia americana Swains., 

 the American Scoter. Both specimens were taken in Charles- 

 ton Harbor in January 1884, and presented to the Museum by 

 Mr. Henry Hunter. The Surf Scoter is a common winter vis- 

 itant. The American Scoter, on the other hand, is a rare bird 

 on the south Atlantic coast, having been previously recorded 

 only twice south of New Jersey, once in Florida and once in South 

 Carolina.^ The South Carolina record is for a male taken by 

 Dr. Eugene Edmund Murphey in Bull's Bay, on May 7, 1903. 

 The specimen which I have discovered in the Charleston Museum 

 must therefore be considered in point of time the first record for 

 the state, being taken nineteen years before Dr. Murphey 's 

 record was made. 



The second noteworthy correction is in the determination of a 

 specimen labelled Ring-necked Duck, Aythya collaris (Donov.), 

 female, and recorded in the Museum catalog^ and in Wayne's 

 Birds of South Carolina"* as the only Ring-necked Duck taken by 

 Mr. Wayne and as the first recorded specimen taken in the state 

 (Jan. 11, 1886). This species is well known to sportsmen and 



iSpec. 160. ^Contr. Chas. Mus. I, 1910, 21. 



'Spec. 143. <p. 19. 



20 



