30 DUCK SHOOTING. 



Although breeding in great numbers on the coast of 

 Labrador and in other Canadian waters, the eider duck 

 is practically not protected there, and indeed is scarcely 

 made use of commercially in America. We have not 

 yet advanced sufficiently to take advantage of our op- 

 portunities. 



Dr. Leonhard Stejneger, in the "Standard Natural 

 History," writing of the European sheldrake 

 (Tadorna) — which must not be confounded with any 

 of the birds (Mergus) which we of the United States 

 call sheldrakes — almost parallels Mr. Shepard's ac- 

 count, but on a smaller scale. He says : "The inhabi- 

 tants on several of the small sandy islands off the west- 

 ern coast of Jutland — notably, the Island of Sylt — have 

 made the whole colony of sheldrakes breeding there a 

 source of considerable income by judiciously taxing 

 the birds for eggs and down, supplying them in return 

 with burrows of easy access and protecting them 

 against all kinds of injury. The construction of such 

 a duck burrow is described by Johann Friedrich Nau- 

 mann, who says that all the digging, with the excep- 

 tion of the entrance tunnel, is made from above. On 

 top of small rounded hills, covered with grass, 

 the breeding chambers are first dug out to a uniform 

 depth of two or three feet. These are then connected by 

 horizontal tunnels and finally with the common en- 

 trance. Each breeding chamber is closed above with a 

 tightly fitting piece of sod, which can be lifted up like a 

 lid when the nest is to be examined and plundered. 

 Such a complex burrow may contain from ten to 



