WILD DUCK 333 



eggs: "A inovviDg machine was set to work round the 

 outside of a field of lucerne bordering our marsh, 

 diminishing the circle each time round the field, leaving 

 about two acres in the centre. A Wild Duck was seen 

 by the shepherd to fly from the piece of lucerne that was 

 left with something in her beak, and happening to fly 

 near him, she dropped a three-parts incubated egg. She 

 was again observed by the shepherd, and also by the 

 sheep-shearer, carrying another egg in her beak, this 

 time over the marsh wall towards the saltings ; and 

 again she was seen for the third time carrying an egg 

 in her beak in the same direction. On the mowing 

 machine going to work next day, and finishing the field 

 by removing the last piece of lucerne, the Wild Duck's 

 nest was discovered from which the eggs had been 

 removed." 



A Wild Duck had a nest of fifteen eggs in September, 

 1898, in Surrenden Dering Park, Kent. These birds 

 were seen m Long Rope Woods on March 13, 1902. 



Mr. T. Hepburn, in his notes on the birds on the beach 

 at Dungeness, in 1902, states that this species " breeds 

 in numbers along the dykes and sewers, and also out on 

 the beach among the stunted sloe and broom bushes. 

 July 16 to 21 : Considerable numbers of young birds on 

 some of the inland patches of water." 



Note. — Wild Duck. — In Hasted's iJ^s^or^ of Kent (vol . 

 vi., p. 167, 1798), under Milton, near Sittingbourne, is 

 the following: "In the north-west part of this parish, 

 among the marshes, there is a decoy for wild-fowl, the 

 only one that I know of in this part of the county. The 

 fowl caught in it are much esteemed for their size and 

 flavour. Great numbers of them are weekly taken and 

 sent up to London." 



