JAN. WILD DUCK — LITTLE AUK. 171 



recede, the birds come out on the banks and graze 

 like geese. 



This season the wild ducks have found out a new 

 kind of food — the remains of the diseased potatoes 

 which have been left in the fields. My attention 

 was first called to their feeding on them by observing 

 that my domesticated wild ducks had managed to 

 dig well into a heap of half-rotten potatoes, which 

 had been put partly under ground, and then covered 

 over with a good thickness of earth, as being unfit 

 for pigs or any other animal. However, the wild 

 ducks had scented them out, and although well 

 supplied with food, they had dug into the heap in all 

 directions, feeding greedily on the rotten potatoes ; in 

 fact, leaving their corn for them. I then found that 

 the wild ducks from the bay flew every evening to the 

 potato-fields to feed on the roots which had been 

 left ; and so fond were they of them, that I often saw 

 the ducks rise from the fields in the middle of the 

 day — in the evening it was always a sure place to 

 get a brace or two. The mallard is very omnivorous 

 at this season : in the crop of one killed were oats, 

 small seed, shrimps, and potatoes, all the produce 

 of his researches during the preceding night. 



We find the remains of the little auk every- 

 where ; some I have seen amongst the furze-bushes, 

 &c., at the distance of fully four miles fi-om the sea. 



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