GAD WALL. 159 



ham ; and in January, 1865, a single bird was shot on 

 the Tare, near the entrance to Surlingham Broad, 

 and one at Reedham, on the same stream, in March, 

 1870. An old male, in my own collection, was killed at 

 Lndham, in April, 1858, but adult males, as in several 

 other species of wildfowl, are less frequently met with 

 than females and young birds ; and, judging from the 

 records in my note books of such only as may fairly 

 be considered migrants, I should say that a few make 

 their appearance on our coast in November and De- 

 cember, more, as a rule, in January and February, and 

 a few pairs occasionally in March and April, as late 

 even, in some seasons, as the 19th and 23rd of the 

 latter month. 



Mr. Dowell informs me that in the month of May, 

 1846, he had two male gadwalls brought to him in the 

 flesh, and in his notes describes this species as neither 

 common nor yet very rare at that time, in the Blakeney 

 marshes, in winter and spring, where it is known, he 

 says, as the " grey duck ;"* and Overton, a then noted 

 gunner, used to describe it as " the yellow-legged mal- 

 lard, with shell markings on the breast." One was 

 seen in the Holkham" marshes, in April, 1854, but from 

 this point of the coast, passing westward towards Lynn, 

 my records of specimens obtained are few and far 

 between. A single bird was shot at Brancaster in 



* In Kay's "Catalogue of English Birds" (1674) this species 

 is entered as " the gadwall or gray Boschas minor torquata" Hunt, 

 also, gives the term " rodge " as a provincialism in Norfolk, but 

 it is apparently obsolete at the present time. 



In Spain, in the Goto de Donana, Lord Lilford ascertained that 

 the local name of this species was " Frisa," a quaint term (re- 

 ferring, no doubt, to the appearance, not the texture, of certain 

 portions of its plumage) signifying coarse cloth or frieze. See 

 Irby's " Ornithology of the Straits of Gibraltar." 



