VOL. XV.] SURFACE-FEEDING DUCKS. 135 



dark horseshoe-shaped markings on the white shield of 

 the fore-neck and breast, the chestnut-brown feathers of the 

 lower breast and belly being retained from the second juvenile 

 plumage. The first nuptial plumage is followed by a first 

 post-nuptial plumage (eclipse), this again by the second 

 nuptial plumage and so on. It is a well-known fact that the 

 enlargement of the bill is not noticeable in the newly hatched 

 duckling, and that the growth of it commences just before 

 the bird is acquiring its first feathers ; this seems to indicate 

 that the broad spoon-shaped bill with its highly developed 

 lamellse is a comparatively recently acquired character, 

 and perhaps this may account for the fact that the male 

 Shoveler exhibits a more primitive sequence of plumages 

 than most other surface-feeding ducks, having retained a 

 complete second juvenile plumage. 



(Number of specimens examined : Coll. E.L.S , 183 

 Univ. Zool. Mus., Copenhagen, 14.) 



The Mallard {Anas p. platyrhyncha) . 



Female. — Down. First juvenile plumage, which is in 

 early autumn followed by a first nuptial plumage ; birds 

 from Denmark especially early ones, show only a few traces 

 of a second juvenile plumage and in spring apparently no 

 other moult takes place than the changing of the uniform 

 greyish secondaries for new ones marked with a buff pattern, 

 and then, if not before, such feathers of a second juvenile 

 plumage which may have been retained are also changed. 

 There is, however, a second juvenile plumage, exhibited by 

 birds coming here in September and later, and in such birds 

 another moult takes place, giving them a more or less complete 

 first nuptial plumage ; some have this moult earlier, others 

 later ; specimens in February and March still show new 

 feathers coming in, while others, young birds nine to ten 

 months old with straight oviducts, are indistinguishable 

 from adults with oviducts that have been in function the 

 preceding year or before. I have seen specimens in March 

 in almost full second juvenile plumage (for instance, No. 2159, 

 15/3/1917- Coll. E.L.S.) — as in other ducks it is very much 

 like the post-nuptial of the adult female — and specimens 

 from Iceland often show this state of plumage, one (No. 1728, 

 i.3/7/i9f'9- North Iceland. Coll. E.L.S.) a July specimen 

 in worn and faded plumage has not even changed the grey 

 secondaries. Such visitors to this countr}^ are probably 

 birds coming from north-eastern districts. 



When the breeding-season is over, the worn and faded 



