MIGRATION. II 
Scoters (Otdemia deglandi) in May is the most pronounced and 
interesting of the local outside movements. In The Auk, Vol. 
VIII, No. 3, page 285, there is a careful account of this migra- 
tion by Mr. George H. Mackay, from which we here quote. The 
Scoters wintering in southern Cape Cod waters migrate “to the 
westward as far as Noank, Connecticut,” past Seaconnet, Point 
Judith and Watch Hill, reaching the north, Mr. Mackay suggests, 
by. ‘Connecticut River and Lake Champlain or Hudson River 
routes.” This migration lasts from “three to seven days, accord- 
ing to the state of the weather,” starting “May 7, which is 
unusually early; the customary time being from the 12th to the 
15th, and the latest the 25th.’’ The flight consists of “appar- 
ently all old birds,’’ and in such fine adult plumage and of such 
large size that the local gunners believe them to be of a different 
species from the other less mature White-winged Scoters seen 
throughout the winter, and have named them May White-wings 
or Great May White-wings for this reason. Mr. Newton Dex- 
ter writes of this flight, “In May they gather in millions, I might 
say, about Vineyard Sound, and farther east. About May 17th 
if the conditions are right, fair weather, a clear sky to the west, 
and a moderate southwest wind, the birds start, fly west along 
the Rhode Island coast going higher and higher in the air as 
they go west, and at or near Watch Hill go over the land and 
take a northwest course for the Great Lakes.” This flight 
“begins about two hours before sunset, and on favorable occa- 
sions several flocks are in sight all the time, from twenty to two 
hundred in a flock.... Many leaders of flocks miss their bear- 
ings and turn up into Narragansett Bay. They then follow up 
to the head waters at the city of Providence, and follow a north- 
west course from there. In Col. J. H. Powel’s List he says “this 
is the hird that comes from the east and .flies to the west in 
its spring migration in May, from the roth to the 2oth, and is 
seen at no other time of year.” 
Mr. Dexter writes of the general Scoter migration, “‘ There are 
seasons when circumstances of wind and weather are favorable 
in both spring and fall migration (in April and October), when 
the Scoters (Americana deglandi and perspici/lata) pass very near 
our shores in vast numbers. On the 16th of last October, 1898, 
