248 BULLETIN 130, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



and later when the birds are flying singly or in small companies they readily 

 draw to decoys. It is then that the gunners get in their most telling work, 

 bags of 75 or 100 birds being sometimes taken in a day. Near Cape Hatteras 

 I once lay in a battery near a local gunner, who shot 50 brant between the 

 hours of 10 a. m. and 2 p. m., and the size of his kill in four hours occasioned 

 no particular comment in the neighborhood. 



DISTRIBUTION 



Breeding range. — Arctic regions north of eastern North America, 

 Europe, and Western Asia. East to Spitsbergen, Franz Joseph 

 Land, Nova Zembla, Kolguev, and the Taimyr Peninsula. On 

 both coasts of Greenhind, south to about 70° N., and north to at 

 least 81° or 82° N. South to about 74° on islands around the Gulf 

 of Boothia, Prince Regent Inlet, and Wellington Channel. West 

 to about 100° or 110° W. Seen in summer and probably breeding 

 as far north as explorers have been, on the Parry Islands, Axel 

 Heiberg Land, Grant Land, and Greenland. Probably intergrades 

 with nigricans at both the eastern and the western limits of its 

 range. 



Winter '/'cr;n(7<?.— Atlantic coast of United States. Regularly from 

 New Jersey to North Carolina ; more rarely eastward to Long 

 Island and Massachusetts (Marthas Vineyard) ; and rarely south 

 to Florida. Coasts of northwestern Europe, from the Baltic and 

 North Seas, to the British Isles and France; occasionally to Mo- 

 rocco, tlijs Mediterranean, and Eg;ypt. Occurs more or less regu- 

 larly on the Pacific coasts of Canada and United States. 



Spring migration. — Fully described above. Early dates of arri- 

 val: New York, Long Island, February 15; Rhode Island, Block 

 Island, March 8 ; Massachusetts, Vineyard Sound, March 10 ; Maine, 

 Englishman Bay, April 22; Quebec, Bay of Seven Islands, May 1; 

 latitude 79° N., May 30; northern Greenland, Etah, June 1; Grin- 

 nell Land, latitude 82°, N., June 7; Boothia Peninsula, June 8; 

 Wellington Channel, June 2. 



Late dates of departure: North Carolina, first week in April; 

 Rhode Island, April 28 ; Massachusetts, Cape Cod, May 17 ; Prince 

 Edw^ard Island, June 12 ; Quebec, Bay of Seven Islands, June 15. 



Fall migration. — Early dates of arrival : Massachusetts, Cape 

 Cod, September 11; Rhode Island, September 17; New York, Long 

 Island, September 8 ; New Jersey, Barnegat Bay, October 14. Main 

 flight reaches the Gulf of St. Lawrence late in September and New 

 England in October. Late dates of departure: Maine, December 

 8 ; Massachusetts, Cape Cod, December 14 ; New York, Long Island, 

 December 20. 



Casual records. — Has wandered east on the fall migration to 

 Labrador (Nain, October, 1899) and Nova Scotia (Sable Island, 



