The Zoologist — October, 1869. 1859 



the Aide. An eye-witness informed me that the reaches of the river 

 between Iken and Snape were literally swarming with mallard, duck 

 and wigeon. This man, who went out after the birds in a punt minus 

 the punt-gun, killed with a small single barrel over thirty fowl in one 

 day, among which were three goldeneyes and a bird which he described 

 to me as the " white-winged wigeon," which had never been seen on 

 the river before by any of the gunners, and it seems that no one knew 

 its proper name. Unfortunately I had no opportunity of examining 

 it, as the man had sold it before I knew of its occurrence. Teal, 

 curiously enough, do not seem to have made their appearance during 

 this spell of cold weather, either on the rivers or in the little streams 

 and reedv brooks, to which a frost often drives them. A few shiel- 

 drakes were observed on the river about this time, and the shooter, 

 to whom I have before referred, managed to kill three at one discharge 

 of his gun, two of which were old females and the remaining bird a 

 very fine male, of unusually heavy weight. A " skein" of bean geese 

 were seen in some pea-fields and fallows near Iken, but none were 

 shot ; and small companies of the tufted duck were noticed near 

 Aldeburgh, and I believe some few scoters, but I do not think any of 

 the latter were obtained. Snipe were very plentiful on the " saltings " 

 while the few days of cold lasted, but on the 10th February I could 

 scarcely find a bird. Jack snipe were common during the winter, 

 and I believe I must have killed quite sixty of these little fellows 

 since the previous October in the marshes near the river. 



BrownJiooded Gull. — On the 13lh February, owing to the heavy rains 

 which fell during the previous day and night, the meadows near the 

 Aide and its branches were laid under water for many miles, and the 

 floods attracted an immense number of gulls and plovers from their 

 usual haunts near the coast. The gulls seemed principally to be Larus 

 ridibundus, with a few common and herring gulls intermixed. Neither 

 of these latter associated with the peewits, but the brown heads did 

 so, flying about in company with the plovers and sitting near them 

 on the grass. The "peewit gull" is a local name for this bird: I 

 amused myself by watching from behind a hedge a flock of about 

 eighty of these pretty little gulls as they circled around in the air ; 

 when one would dash down almost like a hawk until within a few feet 

 of the water, then suddenly rise for a moment and hover, until dipping 

 its blood-red bill into the stream some floating garbage or small fish 

 was secured. At this date the black, or rather brown, hood was 

 not yet assumed ; but two birds which I shot showed sign^ of an 



