ANSER ALBIFRONS ALBIFROXR 85 



the feathers at the hase ol the upper maudible are rather deeper brown than 

 those of the rest of the head ; the nail and point of the beak light-brown ; the 

 pale-brown feathers of the breast are uniform in colour without any dark 

 patches or bars." {Salvadori.) 



As the bird grows older, the white band on the iOrehead appears and 

 grows wider and wider, and, from what can be gathered from present records, 

 seems to get wider eventually in the adult male than in the female, though 

 Salvadori notes no difference in this respect. As regards the colouration 

 of the under-parts, it varies \'ery greatly, this not according to age 

 apparently. Some birds are so mucli marked with black underneath that 

 the white is practically absent, only showing through in small patches here 

 and there : in many the black predominates, whilst in others, the majority, 

 the light colour is much in excess of the dark, in some few there being very 

 little black anywhere. The white on the chin, too, increases with age, and, 

 ]ierhaps to a greater extent, also, on the gander than on the goose. 



Young' birds iu first plumage.— White feathering on head entirely absent, 

 and both on head and along base of upper mandible replaced by brown or 

 brown-black. On light grey belly (where black patches are always wanting) 

 fairly regularly dispersed grey speckles, resulting from the fact that the 

 feathers have grey centres. 



Distribution. — Anser gainheU is now generally accepted as a dis- 

 tinct species (not by Alph^raky), so that the area inhabited by the 

 Indian bird is considerally curtailed and it does not extend to Japan, 

 though it does to the greater part of China. 



Salvadori, however, says that it is true A. (tlhifrons which 

 inhabits Greenland, from which place he excludes A. gamheJi, so 

 that this must now be accepted as one of its breeding-places. 



It is also found through the Palaearctic region from Iceland to 

 Siberia, and in the winter from the Mediterranean shores, Egypt, 

 away west through Asia Minor, Persia, and Northern India. Within 

 our limits, comparing it with the way in which the grey lag and 

 the bar-headed goose occur, the White-fronted Goose is a rarity, 

 but a few do come every year to Sind and parts of the Punjab. The 

 Indian specimens in the British Museum come from Lucknow, and 

 the river Jhelum below Shahpur. 



Hume says that during the thirty years he had shot in India, 

 prior to writing 'Game-Birds,' he only once shot this goose; whether 

 he shot others afterwards I do not know. He records in ' Stray 

 Feathers,' i, p. 2-59, shooting three geese in Sind, only he then 



