SHOVELER. 175 
some by dabbling in the water. They also swallow small 
stones. 
The nest of this species, built besides rivers, lakes, and 
other waters, or in watery places, appears to be made of 
grass, commingled with down from the bird itself. In some 
eases the bare earth or sand is scarcely covered with any 
materials; in others, a tuft of grass is laid in. After the 
female has begun to sit, she covers the eggs with down 
plucked from her own body. 
The eggs are as many as eight, nine, ten, or twelve in 
number. They are of a buff white colour, with a tinge of 
green. 
Incubation lasts three weeks. The young leave the nest 
almost immediately after being hatched, and repair with their 
mother to the water. 
This species bred in the year 1854, in the gardens of the 
Zoological Society, London. ; 
Male; weight, about twenty-two ounces; length, about one 
foot eight inches; bill, long, and dark brownish lJead-colour, 
the edges much dilated towards the tip. The tooth is small 
and turned inwards, and the margins of the bill in this bird 
are even more than ordinarily pectinated in both mandibles 
with the processes which fit ito each other so as to act as 
a sieve for the food. Iris, bright yellow; head, crown, and 
neck on the back, brownish green, with a purple reflection, 
which colours in the summer change on the crown to blackish 
brown, spotted with lighter brown, and slightly glossed with 
green; the sides of the head and neck, reddish white, speckled 
with brown. Nape, white, in summer blackish brown, with 
the feathers margined with paler, and slightly glossed with 
green. ‘lhe throat in summer is reddish white, speckled with 
brown; breast above white, on the middle rich chesnut brown; 
in summer ferruginous, spotted with black, and on the sides 
with zigzag lines of the same; below, white. In summer it 
becomes a mixture of yellowish brown and orange brown, or 
reddish white, the feathers being spotted with black. Back, 
dusky brown, on the middle dark brown, the edges of the 
feathers lighter-coloured, and glossed with green; on the 
lower part nearly black, tinged with green; in summer it 
becomes deep brown, margined with pale yellowish brown. 
The wings have the second quill feather the longest; greater 
wing coverts, brown, tipped with white, forming thereby a 
bar across the wing; lesser wing coverts, pale blue; primaries, 
