Plate-billed Swimmers 



and of the swans. Body is not so flat as the duck's and more 

 elevated on the longer legs. Geese, that spend far more time on 

 land, walk better than ducks, and depend altogether on a vege- 

 table diet. When we see them tipping, with head immersed in 

 the water and tail in air, they are probing the bottom for roots 

 and seeds of plants, not for water insects or mollusks. In com- 

 mon with swans they resent intrusion by hissing with out- 

 stretched necks and by striking with the wings. When wounded 

 on the water, a goose dives; then, with only its bill exposed 

 above the surface, strikes out for land, where it evidently feels 

 more at home. The sexes are generally alike in plumage, which 

 undergoes only one moult a year; and both parents attend to the 

 young as no self-respecting drake would do. A wedge-shaped 

 flock of migrating geese, with an old gander in the lead at the 

 point of the V, old sportsmen say, is a familiar sight in the spring 

 and autumn skies, that echo with the honk, honk, or noisy cack- 

 lings, coming from the distended necks of the travellers. 



White-fronted Goose. 



Snow Goose. 



Lesser Snow Goose. 



Canada, or Wild Goose. 



Brant. 



Black Brant. 



Swans 



(Subfamily Cygninix) 



Bare skin between the eye and bill is the scientific mark of 

 distinction between swans and geese ; many other points of dif- 

 ference are too well known to mention. Swans feed on small 

 mollusks in addition to vegetable matter which they secure by 

 "tipping" or by simply immersing their long, graceful necks. 

 They migrate in V-shaped flocks like the geese, and often utter 

 loud, trumpeting notes unlike the noisy gabble of both geese 

 and ducks. Plumage of sexes alike. 



Whistling Swan. 



Trumpeter Swan. 



86 



