NORMAN GILROY: THE GOOSANDER. 401 



pair of ducks, which suddenly rose from the loch and 

 flew rapidly towards me. I was at first unable to determine 

 accurately the species. But fortunately the sun was 

 shining brightly ; still more fortunately the birds came 

 quite close to me before they turned, so that the charac- 

 teristic plumage of the male was easily discernible. After 

 turning once they flew round at varying heights in wide 

 ellipses, the duck leading, whilst both birds uttered a 

 curiously muffled, but harsh, quacking noise. I noticed 

 that the duck invariably dived down over a particular 

 spot on the hillside, and it at once struck me that the nest 

 was not far from this point, so that when they finally 

 flew down to the loch again I started to explore the hill- 

 side carefully in the immediate neighbourhood of the spot 

 mentioned. The ground was sparingly strewn with 

 boulders of considerable size, most of them half buried 

 in the soil, but at the base of the second one, which I 

 examined, was a wide dry cavity containing a lot of 

 withered grass which had evidently not been blown there 

 by the wind. I could not possibly reach it or get at it 

 from the front in any way, but found that by the removal 

 of some small stones from behind the whole cavity could 

 be comfortably examined, and in it was the Goosander's 

 nest, containing one fresh egg. The nest itself was com- 

 posed of masses of white, withered grass, and at this time 

 I saw only one or two down tufts. I visited the nest 

 twice afterwards, but had no opportunity of seeing the 

 duck sitting, as I had to come south before the clutch 

 was completed. An egg appeared to be laid every 

 other day, and I afterwards heard from a gillie, to whomi 

 I showed the nest, that this bird ultimately laid eight. 



I had no further experience of the Goosander until 

 1908 ; for, although each spring up till then I carefully, 

 searched a heavily wooded hillside hanging right over a 

 Sutherland loch, I could never discover a nest, in spite of 

 the fact that after perhaps a fortnight's hunting I in- 

 variably saw the duck Goosander with her young on the 

 water. 



