18 BULLETIN 135, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



the pink skin shows plainly. The down increases in length and den- 

 sity until the bird is entirely covered with thick wooly down. The 

 wing quills appear at an early age and the first, or juvenal plumage 

 is aquired before the young bird leaves the nest. This is mainly 

 white, with a shght suffusion of pink under the wings and in the tail; 

 the crown, cheeks, and throat are covered with white plumage, and 

 not naked as in adults; in the juvenal wing the outer primaries are 

 dusky-tipped, about haK of the outer webs and less than half of the 

 inner webs, the amount of dusky decreasing inwardly; the prir . "V 

 coverts and the greater wing coverts, are similarly marked. ao 



The first winter plumage is a continuation of the juvenal, ''i«T 

 progressive changes toward maturity. The head and neck rcL ■'^■^ 

 white, but the mantle and breast become gradually pinker. In so. ' 

 juvenal birds a little carmine appears in the lesser wing coverts and 

 upper tail coverts during the winter and spring, but usually thert ^ 

 no trace of this color during the first year. The dusky-tipped wing 

 coverts are molted before spring, but not the remiges. The tail is 

 molted and replaced by one which is very pale buff. The feath«i &d 

 head and the juvenal primaries are retained until the first complete 

 molt takes place in summer, from June to September. 



At this molt, the first postnuptial, the young bird assumes a plum- 

 age which is much like that of the winter adult. The head, crown, 

 cheeks, and throat, become wholly or partially naked; the wings, 

 tail, and body are all pink, but with no carmine; and the neck and 

 part of the breast are white. Sometimes this second winter plumage 

 is worn without much change through the following spring; but usu- 

 ally at the second prenuptial molt, in late winter or early spring, a 

 second nuptial plumage is assumed, including the buff tail, the car- 

 mine lesser wing coverts and more or less of the roseate and carmine 

 colors in the body plumage. This plumage is much like the adult 

 nuptial, but the highest perfection of plumage is not assumed until 

 the following year, when the young bird is nearly three years old. 



The adult apparently has a complete postnuptial molt in summer, 

 mainly in July, August, and September, and an incomplete prenuptial 

 molt in January, February, and March, which involves the tail, the 

 lesser wing coverts and most of the contour plumage. In the 

 highest perfection of the adult nuptial plumage there is much rich 

 carmine in the lesser wing coverts and in the upper and lower tail 

 coverts; a bunch of curly carmine feathers adorns the center of the 

 breast, which is also suffused with pink and with "ochraceous buff"; 

 sometimes the neck is mottled with a few carmine feathers; and the 

 tail is a rich "ochraceous buff." I have seen birds in full nuptial 

 plumage in November and December, but am inclined to think that 

 these are exceptional. In most of the birds that I have called 

 winter adults the carmine markings have been lacking or nearly so, 



