534 BRITISH BIRDS. 



ANAS ACUTA. 



PINTAIL. 



(PLATE 63.) 



Anas longicauda, Briss. Orn. vi. p. 369 (1760). 



Anas acuta, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 202 (1766) ; et auctorum plurimorum Gmelin, 



Latham, Temminck, (Dresser), (Sounders), &c. 

 Anas alandica, Sparrm. Mus. Carls, iii. pi. 60 (1786). 

 Anas sparrmanni, Lath. Ind. Orn. ii. p. 876 (1790). 

 Anas caudacuta, Leach, Syst. Cat. Mamm. fyc. Brit. Mus. p. 38 (1816). 

 Dafila caudacuta (Leach), Steph. Shaw's Gen. Zool. xii. pt. ii. p. 127 (1824). 

 Trachelonetta acuta (Linn.}, Kaup, Naturl. Syst. p. 115 (1829). 

 Anas caudata, Brehm, Vog. Deutschl. p. 869 (1831). 

 Phasianurus acutus (Linn.), Wagl. Isis, 1832, p. 1235. 

 Querquedula acuta (Linn.}, Selby, Brit. Orn. ii. p. 331 (1833). 

 Dafila acuta (Linn.}, Eyton, Cat. Brit. B. p. 60 (1836). 

 Querquedula caudacuta (Leach), Macgill. Man. Brit. B. p. 170 (1840). 

 Dafila acuta, var. americana, Bonap. Compt. Rend. xlii. p. 650 (1856). 



The Pintail is best known as a winter visitor to the British Islands, but 

 there can be scarcely any doubt that a few remain to breed. It appears 

 only to pass the Shetlands sparingly on migration, but is said to be common 

 in winter on the Orkneys. It has occurred in almost every county of 

 Scotland, but is much rarer on the west than on the east coast, and has 

 only once been known to stray to the Outer Hebrides. It is a tolerably 

 frequent visitor to the east and south coasts of England, but appears to be 

 rarer in the west. Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey states that it does not 

 frequent the north of Ireland, and is rarely met with on the large loughs 

 of Antrim, Londonderry, Down, and Donegal ; but south of Athlone it is 

 not uncommon. He has observed it in large flocks on the estuaries of 

 Clare, Connaught, and Kerry, and on Castle-Gregory Lake in co. Clare he 

 has seen them in hundreds. Hancock states that it formerly bred on the 

 now drained marsh of Prestwick Car in Northumberland ; whilst, in Ire- 

 land, Sir R. Payne-Gallwey remarks that one or two pairs breed every year 

 at Lord Castletown's Duck-preserves at Abbeyleix, in Queen's County; 

 and that he has seen females with young broods on Loughs Mask and 

 Corrib in co. Galway. They also probably breed on Lough Inagh in Con- 

 nemara. 



The Pintail Duck is a circumpolar bird, breeding in great numbers 

 throughout the Arctic regions as far north as lat. 70. South of lat. 60 it 



