QUERQUEDULA. 



301 



Querquedula circia. The Garganey or Bluc-wingcd Teal. 



Querquedula circia, Lin. ; P. E. 946 ; Gould. B. Eur. pi. 364 j 

 Jerd. B. Ind. iii. p. 807; Str. F. iv. 20] ; Murray, Edbk., Zool, Sj'c, 

 Bind, p. 235; Hume, Game Birds Ind. iii. p. 215. — The Gaeganey or 

 Blue-winged Teal. 



Male. — Forehead purplish brown, finely streaked with white ; crown 

 of the head, occiput, nape, and a line half way down the back of the neck 

 dark umber or blackish brown, bounded on each side by the white 

 superciliary streak, which extends to the sides of the neck ; face, sides 

 of the neck, cheeks, throat and neck chestnut brown, the feathers with 

 white mesial streaks ; chin black ; breast and upper abdomen yellowish 

 brown, tinged in some specimens with ferruginous, and with broad 

 crescentic dark brown markings ; lower abdomen white or yellowish white, 

 with, in some specimens, transverse, dusky strise behind ; flanks with 

 transverse undulations of black and white ; axillaries white with black 

 bases ; back brownish black, the feathers edged with yellowish brown ; 

 primaries dark brown on their outer webs and tips, pale wood brown on 

 their inner webs, in some specimens narrowly edged with whitish j wing 

 spot on outer web of secondaries dull green, slightly glossed and tipped 

 with white, the white tips forming the second bar across the wing ; 

 greater coverts ashy grey or bluish ashy, broadly tipped with white ; 

 lesser and median coverts ashy grey, or bluish ashy ; scapulars long and 

 lanceolate, black, with a mesial white shaft, and narrowly edged greyish 

 white, or white; tertiaries dusky brown, edged with white on their 

 outer webs ; rump and upper tail-coverts dark brown, with bars of 

 yellowish white ; tail dark brown, the feathers edged with yellowish or 

 fulvous white ; under tail-coverts yellowish white with black spots ; 

 bill black above, brownish on the lower mandible ; irides brown ; legs 

 and feet greenish grey or plumbeous. 



Length.— Ib'b to 16-6 inches, wing 7-2 to 8, tail 3*2 to 3-5, bill 1*75 

 to 1-85. 



The Female has the chin and throat white; head on the crown 

 brown with spots and streaks of a darker shade ; back of neck brown, 

 the feathers edged with white ; eye-streak faint ; speculum dull and 



