Il6 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. 



30. Aythya affinis (Eyt.). 

 Lesser Scaup Duck. Lesser Scaup. Blue-bill. 



A transient visitor to our larger ponds, not uncommon in autumn. 



SEASONAL occurrence. 



April 8, 1882, one ad. male^ taken, Charles River, East Watertown, C. R. Lamb. 

 May 5, 1892, one male and one female seen, Lower Mystic Pond, W. Faxon. 



October 18, 1869, four seen, three taken. Fresh Pond, W. Brewster. 

 December 6, 1900, six seen. Fresh Pond, W. Deane. 



In the earlier years of my shooting experience small flocks of Lesser 

 Scaups frequently alighted in Fresh Pond in autumn. They were usually 

 rather tame and, like the Ruddy Ducks and Scoters, loath to leave the pond, 

 even when repeatedly fired at. I do not remember to have ever met with them 

 in spring, but I have a male in full plumage which Mr. Charles R. Lamb shot 

 on April 8, 1882, in Charles River, near the Watertown Arsenal, and Mr. 

 Walter Faxon tells me that he saw a pair on May 5, 1892, and three birds 

 together on May i, 1893, in the Lower Mystic Pond. 



On November 22, 1900, and again on the 26th of that month, I found a 

 male Scaup, which I identified as affinis, swimming, in company with some 

 Ruddy Ducks, in Fresh Pond where, later the same autumn (on December 6), 

 Mr. Walter Deane observed a flock of six birds which he feels sure belonged to 

 this species. I also learn from Mr. J. H. Hardy, Jr., that a flock of seven 

 Lesser Scaups were seen in Spy Pond during " a rainy day in the last week of 

 October, 1899," and that he shot one of them. 



The instances last mentioned are all that my notes supply of the recent 

 occurrence of this species in the Cambridge Region. About four miles to the 

 southward, however, in Jamaica Pond — which, by the way, is surrounded by a 

 much more thickly settled and bustling neighborhood than that bordering on 

 any of our Cambridge ponds — • the Lesser Scaup has appeared regularly and 

 in considerable numbers during the past few years. Mr. Harold Bowditch tells 

 me that he first noticed it there in December, 1900, when he saw about thirty 

 birds on the 15th of the month and nearly as many on the following day. On 

 December i, 1 901, he observed upward of fifty in the pond at one time. He 



1 No. 8207, collection of William Brewster. 



