358 THE GAME BIEDS AND WILD FOWL 



Family ANATIDJJ}. Genus MARECA. 



Subfamily ANATIN&. 



WIQEON. 



MAKECA PENELOPE (Linnccus). 

 PLATE XXXV. 



Anas penelope, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 202 (1766) ; Seebohm, Hist. Brit. B. iii. p. 539 



(1885) ; Dixon, Nests and Eggs Brit. B. p. 230 (1893) ; Seebohm, Col. Pig. Eggs 



Brit. B. p. 38, pi. 13 (1896). 

 Mareca penelope (Linn.), Macgill. Brit. B. v. p. 83 (1852) ; Dresser, B. Eur. vi. p. 541, 



pis. 432, 433 (1876) ; Yarrell, Brit. B. ed. 4, iv. p. 397 (1885) ; Lilford, Col. Fig. 



Brit. B. pt. xv. (1890) ; Salvadori, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxvii. p. 227 (1895) ; Sharpe, 



Handb. B. Gt. Brit. ii. p. 277 (1896). 



Geographical distribution. British: The Wigeon is a common 

 winter visitor to the British Islands, frequenting inland swamps and waters as 

 well as the coast. Many pass our coast lines on passage to still more southern 

 haunts, and return along them in spring, so that the bird is generally most abun- 

 dant in autumn. It frequents all parts of the United Kingdom suited to its 

 requirements. A few remain behind to breed in Scotland, and frequent for this 

 purpose Boss, Sutherland, Caithness, Cromarty, Perthshire, and Selkirkshire, and 

 the Orkneys and Shetlands. The nest does not yet appear to have been met with 

 in the Hebrides. In Ireland it is said to have nested in Antrim, Armagh, Tyrone, 

 and Mayo counties, but recent information is wanting. Although supposed to have 

 bred in Norfolk, there is no actual proof of the fact, and the birds that recently 

 bred in Yorkshire (near Scarborough) cannot be regarded as strictly wild. Foreign : 

 Palaearctic region, more southerly in winter ; Oriental region, and extreme western 

 and eastern confines of Nearctic region in winter. It breeds throughout Arctic 

 Europe and Asia from about lat. 70 southwards. Under ordinary circumstances its 

 southern breeding range is lat. 60 ; south of which it is only known to nest in 

 exceptional conditions. These conditions appear to exist in France, Germany, 

 Denmark, Bohemia, and the valley of the Danube in Europe, and in the Baikal 

 basin in Asia, in all of which localities it is known to breed. It is said to breed in 

 the Faroes, and certainly does so in Iceland ; and is an accidental visitor to 

 Greenland, and to the Atlantic coasts of North America ; whilst on the eastern 

 limits of its range it occasionally wanders across Behring Strait, where it has 



