808 THE BLACK-THROATED LOON, 
Young Loons “dive from the shell,” and master water thoroly before 
they dream of flying. Soon after the chicks are brought off, the parents 
separate for the rest of the season, the male retiring either to some unfre- 
quented lake or to the sea-coast, to undergo the summer moult. At this season 
both birds cast their feathers, so thoroly indeed, as to be for a time quite 
incapacitated for flight. When the young birds can use their wings they are 
taken to salt water, and lead thenceforth an idle life, whose chief, or it mn. 
be sole, anxiety is the dodging of bullets. 
No. 361. 
BLACK-THROATED LOON. 
A. O, U. No. 9. Gavia arctica (Linn.). 
Description.—Adult in summer: (Somewhat similar to preceding species but 
top of head, and nape, bluish gray); chin and throat black with violet and purplish 
reflections, shading into dull smoke-gray on crown and light ashy on hind neck; a 
patch of abrupt white streaks on side of upper throat, and below this a necklace 
of sharp white streaks across it; upperparts brownish black with purplish reflec- 
tions; feathers of scapulars and interscapulars each with subterminal squarish 
spot of white, thus forming four patches of transverse white rows; wing-coverts 
speckled with smaller oval white spots; below white, abruptly defined from throat, 
less so from black of sides and flanks, shading thru patch of sharp black-and-white 
streaks on sides of neck and breast; bill and feet black; irides red. Adult in 
winter, and immature: Corresponding closely with similar stages in G. immer, 
and distinguishable with certainty only by smaller size. Length 27.00 (685); 
wing 11.00 (279.4); bill 2,00 (50.8) ; tarsus 2.60 (66), 
Recognition Marks.—lirant size; like G. immer but smaller; top of head 
and nape in summer plumage bluish gray; without white speckling on back, as 
distinguished from Gavia stellata; not to be distinguished out of hand even in 
breeding plumage from the next “species”; larger. 
Nesting.—Does not breed in Washington. Nest and Eggs as in preceding. 
Av. of eggs, 3.15 x 2.05 (80x 52.1). 
General Range.—Northern part of the Northern Hemisphere; common in 
Arctic America; rare or casual in winter in northern portions of the United 
States, chiefly east of the Rocky Mountains. 
Range in Washington.—Rare winter visitant—two records of occurrence on 
Puget Sound. 
Authorities.—Rhoads, Auk, Vol. X. Jan. ‘93, p. 16. 
MR. SAMUEL N. RHOADS was the first to record the occurrence of 
this species in Washington. Reporting upon his reconnoissance in 1892, he 
says of it: “A female was secured at Nisqually and others noted there during 
