322 THE GAME BIEDS AND WILD FOWL 



Family ANATID^. Genus ANSER. 



Subfamily ANSERINE. 



GREY LAG GOOSE. 



ANSER CINEEEUS Meyer. 



Anas anser, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 197 (1766). 



Anser ferus, Schaeff. ; Macgill. Brit. B. iv. p. 589 (1852); Salvadori, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. 



xxvii. p. 89 (1895). 

 Anser cinereus, Meyer ; Dresser, B. Eur. vi. p. 355, pi. 411 (1878) ; Yarrell, Brit. B. 



ed. 4, iv. p. 253 (1885); Seebohm, Hist. Brit. B. iii. p. 500 (1885) ; Lilford, Col. 



Fig. Brit. B. pt. xxvi. (1893) ; Dixon, Nests and Eggs Brit. B. p. 224 (1893) ; 



Seebohm, Col. Fig. Eggs Brit. B. p. 32, pi. 8 (1896). 

 Anser anser (Linn.), Sharpe, Handb. B. Gt. Brit. ii. p. 227 (1896). 



Geographical distribution. British : The Grey Lag Goose is most 

 probably the original form from which the domestic Goose was derived. It 

 formerly bred in the fens and marshes of East Anglia, but for nearly a hundred 

 years now has ceased to do so, the reclamation of so much of the swampy wastes 

 in this district causing it to forsake its ancient strongholds. Its only breeding 

 places now are in the north of Scotland, especially in the Outer Hebrides, as I 

 know from personal experience, in Boss, Sutherland, and Caithness. In Ireland 

 a colony of birds in a half-domestic state have their breeding place on the lake at 

 Castle Coole, the seat of Lord Belmore, in Co. Monaghan. It is a winter visitor 

 to the British Islands, accidental in the Orkneys and Shetlands, rare on the east 

 coast of Scotland, more abundant on the east coast of England, but rare on the 

 south. It is rare on the west coasts of England and Scotland, and very local in 

 Ireland, mostly in the central counties and the sea lough at the mouth of the 

 Shannon. Foreign: Palaearctic region; northern Oriental region in winter. It 

 breeds throughout Scandinavia and Denmark, and Russia below the Arctic circle 

 in all suitable localities south to the Caucasus. It also breeds sparingly in North 

 Germany, and still more rarely in Holland and South-western Spain ; and is 

 known to do so in the valley of the Danube. Eastwards it may probably breed 

 in Central Persia and in the valley of the Obb as far north as the Arctic circle, 

 but in the remainder of Siberia it does not appear to extend north of Lake Baikal. 

 It breeds in the upper valley of the Amoor, in Mongolia, and Turkestan. On 

 migration it occurs in the Faroes, and is said to breed in Iceland. It visits 

 Holland, Belgium, and France on passage, sometimes remaining to winter 



