DUCKS. 165 



estuaries, many individuals finding their way for 

 some distance up the rivers. Pulteney remarks that 

 in hard winters it has been " shot on the coast, about 

 the fleets at Poole, upon the Stour at Bryanstou, and 

 about Morden pond and decoy." Nine were shot 

 in Portland Eoads in one week in the winter of 

 1849-50, about which time others were shot at Wey- 

 mouth. Mr. H. Groves has a pair procured at Wey- 

 mouth in the winter of 1857. In January i860 a 

 fine male was killed on the water in Morden Park, 

 and since that date scarcely a winter elapses without 

 several being reported from different parts of the 

 coast, or from inland waters at no great distance 

 from the sea. 



The male Smew in fully adult plumage is rarely 

 obtained, females and young birds being more fre- 

 quently met with. Young males during their first 

 year resemble the females, and do not attain the 

 white plumage of the adult male until their second 

 autumn moult ; at which period also the young 

 females assume the adult plumage, and exhibit for 

 the first time the black lores. It is somewhat 

 curious that Colonel Hawker, who must have been 

 well acquainted with the wild-fowl frequenting the 

 coast of Dorsetshire, makes no mention of this 



