Species XX. ANAS MARILA. 



SCAUP DUCK. 



[Plate LXIX. Fig. 3.] 



I.e petit Morillon rayi, Briss. vi., p. 416, 2C. A. — Arct. Zool. No. 498. — Lath. Syv,, 



HI., p. .500. 



This Duck is better known among us by the name of the Blue-bill. 

 It is an excellent diver ; and according to Willoughby feeds on a cer- 

 tain small kind of shell fish called scaup, whence it has derived its 

 name. It is common both to our fresh-water rivers and seashores in 

 winter. Those that frequent the latter are generally much the fattest, 

 on account of the greater abundance of food along the coast. It is 

 sometimes abundant in the Delaware, particularly in those places where 

 small snails, its favorite shell fish, abound ; feeding also, like most of its 

 tribe, by moonlight. They generally leave us in April, though I have 

 met with individuals of this species so late as the middle of May, among 

 the salt marshes of New Jersey. Their flesh is not of the most delicate 

 kind, yet some persons esteem it. That of the young birds is generally 

 the tenderest and most palatable. 



The length of the Blue-bill is nineteen inches, extent twenty-nine 

 inches ; bill broad, generally of a light blue, sometimes of a dusky lead 

 color ; irides reddish ; head tumid, covered with plumage of a dark 

 glossy green; extending half way down the neck ; rest of the neck and 

 breast black, spreading round to the back ; back and scapulars white, 

 thickly crossed with waving lines of black ; lesser coverts dusky, pow- 

 dered with veins of whitish, primaries and tertials brownish black ; 

 secondaries white, tipped with black, forming the speculum ; rump and 

 tail-coverts black ; tail short, rounded, and of a dusky brown ; belly 

 white, crossed near the vent with waving lines of ash ; vent black ; legs 

 and feet dark slate. 



Such is the color of the bird in its perfect state. Young birds vary 

 considerably, some having the head black mixed with gray and purple, 

 others the back dusky with little or no white, and that irregularly 

 dispersed. 



The female has the front and sides of the same white, head and half 

 of the neck blackish brown ; breast, spreading round to the bark, >t 

 dark sooty brown, broadly skirted with whitish ; back black, thinly 

 sprinkled with grains of white, vent whitish ; wings the same as in the 



male. 



(115) 



