FOREWORD 



I wish, at the outset, to state frankly that I am not an ornithologist. 

 From boyhood, however, I have taken a keen interest in wildfowl, and I 

 have indulged to a limited extent in the grand sport of duck shooting. 

 As a gunner I have always felt, along with others of the fraternity, the 

 need of a handbook dealing exclusively with the Ducks, Geese, and 

 Swans a portable book one which would readily provide the answers 

 and settle the arguments that take place around the camp stove after a 

 day's shoot. 



I believe that most gunners want to know more about the birds that 

 furnish their favorite pastime, but to obtain this knowledge from exist- 

 ing literature it is necessary to possess an extensive library. This is not 

 possible in the case of most of us, and, any event, it would not be at 

 hand when most needed. 



With much trepidation, therefore, and with a full realization of my 

 lack of qualification for the task, I undertook to compile the kind of 

 manual which I, myself, had long desired, and which I felt was the type 

 of book that the majority of gunners and many naturalists would find 

 useful. 



All of the Ducks, Geese and Swans native to North America, as well 

 as such extralimital species as are frequent visitors to this continent, are 

 included in this work. 



Nothing original is contributed by this book, as everything it con- 

 tains has been gleaned from the researches and writings of others. I do 

 believe, however, that the manner of presentation of the data is novel, 

 that the type of information included is that which is desired, and that, 

 within its scope, the book is complete. The same pattern has been strictly 

 followed throughout the text, so that the reader, once he has become 

 familiar with the plan of the book, should never be at a loss to find de- 

 sired information. 



All the "Descriptions" have been carefully verified from the large 

 collection of skins at the Royal Ontario Museum of Zoology, at Toronto, 

 amplified where necessary from the collection of the National Museum 

 of Canada, at Ottawa. The descriptions of the soft parts (bills, feet and 

 eyes) were written after consultation with such standard works of refer- 

 ence as Coues, Forbush, Roberts, Witherby, and Grinnell, Bryant and 

 Storer, and compared with the Dwight Collection of Soft Part Studies 

 by Major Allan Brooks, at the Royal Ontario Museum of Zoology, and 

 checked with the studies of soft parts made by T. M. Shortt. 



The weights and other measurements were furnished through the 

 kind cooperation of many of the leading museums of the United States 

 and Canada, and of many individual ornithologists. The number of 

 measurements given in this book are considerably greater than any that 

 have heretofore been published, and I believe that in most cases the fig- 



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