SHELD DRAKE. I.j5 



the adult plumage of the shoveler." Now supposing 

 that this bird was hatched by the end of May (Mr. 

 Salmon found a nest of eight eggs on the 10th) it 

 would not have acquired its mature dress before the 

 end of the following March or beginning of April ; yet 

 even this would not have been so abnormally late, in 

 this respect, as the old male shoveler on the Easton 

 pond was in the re-assumption of its breeding plumage, 

 since I have seen a young male in about half change 

 on the 24th of January, and one with still slight traces 

 of immaturity in the breast feathers in the last week 

 in March. It would seem, therefore, that whilst the old 

 males in November and December are rapidly perfecting 

 their distinctive garb, the young males of the year at 

 the same period still combine the characteristics of both 

 sexes. Two important points of difference between the 

 adult male shoveler in its post nuptial dress and the 

 female are thus given in Dresser's " Birds of Europe " : 

 in the male '^'the bright green speculum and blue on 

 the wings which it never casts" ; in the female the iris 

 being hazel brown instead of yellow as in the male. 



Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., has kindly supplied me with 

 notes on the peculiar ruddy tinge observed by himself 

 on the breast of hen shovelers in the London markets, 

 between November and April. Under date of March 

 22nd, 1871, he writes, " I saw at least fifty ! the breasts 

 of all the females were more or less rufous. I do not 

 think it was the rusty stain which is often seen in pin- 

 tails, teal, &c., in the spring especially, but the real 

 colour of the plumage." In this I quite concur, having 

 seen one or two of these rufous females in Mr. Gumey's 

 collection, but, whilst the majority of the shovelers seen 

 by him m Leadenhall and Newgate markets were, no 

 doubt, Dutch fowl, it is somewhat singular that I can 

 recall no instance of a rufous-breasted hen shoveler 

 coming under my notice in this county. In 1870, as 

 w 2 



