THE SURF SCOTER 



By T. GILBERT PEARSON 



EDUCATIONAL LEAFLET No. 83 



If you chance to be aboard a vessel steaming up the Hudson River late in 

 October, you may see, if you keep a sharp lookout, numerous flocks of wild 

 Ducks. If you examine these through a field-glass, you will probably discover 

 some that appear larger than others, and that many of them are black. Watch 

 closely for such birds, for these large black Ducks of the open waters are pretty 

 sure to be Surf Scoters. They do not remain here long, and after the middle 

 of November are rarely seen on the Hudson River. At this season they also 

 frequent the waters of Lake Champlain, and to some extent other lakes and 

 rivers, particularly along the seaboard; they are numerous, too, at some points 

 in the Great Lakes. The Scoters come down from the north, along with the 

 general movement of the feathered hosts that are fleeing before the freezing 

 advance of the Ice King. Being particularly fond of open water, few, indeed, 

 are the individuals that care to linger in lakes and rivers which may freeze. 

 Hence, if we want to find the Surf Scoter in winter, we must journey down to 

 the sea. Out in the rolling Atlantic, off Long Island, they are usually numerous 

 at this season, and also may be met with along the New England Coast, where 

 they begin to arrive early in September. They occur along the coast southward 

 as far as South Carolina, and some have been known to wander to Florida. In 

 the Pacific Ocean, off Washington and Oregon, they are even more abundant 

 than in the Atlantic, and at times go as far south as northern Mexico. 



Of the three species of Scoters found in North America, it is possible that 

 this is most abundant. E. W. Nelson mentions a flock found by him near 

 Stewart Island, Alaska, which formed a continuous bed of black bodies sitting 

 closely together on the water over an area that averaged more than half a 

 mile in width and about ten miles in length. This observation was made late 

 in the breeding season, and apparently all the birds were males. When rising 

 from the water the noise from their wings was like the continuous roar of some 

 gigantic cataract. The species must have been very numerous for these were 

 all males, and we must remember that females and young were doubtless in 

 far greater numbers in the neighborhood. 



The summer home of the Surf Scoter is in the far North. None is known to 

 rear its young in the United States. Those occasionally found in our borders 

 in summer are either cripples, as the result of winter shooting, or are non- 

 breeding individuals. They nest in suitable localities north of a line drawn 

 through Labrador, northern Quebec, Great Slave Lake, and southern Alaska. 

 Audubon, describing a nest which he found in Labrador, wrote: 



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