9528 Birds. 



proportionate increase in the nurabers of the common snipe, but if , 

 anj'thing they have been scarcer than in former seasons. 



Wild Duck avd Pochard. — It is several years since we have been 

 visited by such numbers of these birds as have occurred on and about 

 the River Hull during the present winter. The species have included 

 principally mallard, teal, widgeon, pochard, scaup and goldeneye. 

 The goldeneye, which in ordinary seasons is one of our rarer ducks, 

 has this year been unusually abundant, and several splendid old male 

 birds, in fully mature pluuiage, have been obtained. In former years 

 we have had several flocks of the tufted duck, and I have always looked 

 upon them as common winter visitants here ; this year, however, I have 

 not seen a single specimen : speaking of this duck, I have invariably 

 observed that it is the rarest circumstance possible to obtain a mature 

 female, all the birds being males, old and young, with now and then a 

 young female. I have in my collection the only specimen of a mature 

 female tuCted duck that I have seen shot on our own river, the Hull. 

 The goldeneycs, on the other hand, are generally young males, with 

 now and then an old female. The widgeons shot on the Hull are 

 usually male birds, either old or young; a really mature female is 

 quite a rara avis. The sexes of the mallard and teal are pretty equally 

 distributed. Is it possible that at this season of the year, in some 

 species of ducks, the sexes separate, as iu some other species of birds, 

 as, for instance, the chaffinch ? 



Muscovy Duck. — One evening during the second week of February 

 last, James Bishoprick, of Beverley, brought nae a young female of this 

 duck he had just shot. Hearing a rushing noise, as of the wings of a 

 large bird, he started round from where he was standing at his work 

 as a stonemason, and saw a large bird flying swiftly past. It shortly 

 alighted in the neighbouring play-ground of one of our schools. 

 Having obtained permission, he ran for his gun, and, finding the bird 

 still in the play-ground, shot it. No one that 1 know of keeps the 

 muscovy duck within several miles of Beverley, so that the bird (pro- 

 bably an escaped specimen) must have flown either by stages or at one 

 flight, for a considerable distance. I was aware that the female of this 

 duck possessed considerable powers of flight, but from its long domes- 

 tication I did not know that it was apt to leave its native yard very 

 far. The male is usually too unwieldy to indulge in extensive flights. 

 My specimen is of a glossy blackish brown colour on the back and 

 shoulders; primaries white; head speckled brown and white, the 

 brown prevailing and extending downwards under the chin for about 

 two inches, at which point it terminates abruptly in a distinct line 



