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Notes on Birds in 1878-9. By T. H. Gibb, Alnwick. 



Polish Swan ( Cygnus immutabilis). — In the last week of De- 

 cember, 1878, a very fine specimen of this rare British bird was 

 shot at Alnmouth. Its capture was recorded in the Newcastle 

 Daily Journal, but by some mistake it was described as a Hooper 

 [Cygnus ferus). Subsequently, however, it was sent to me for 

 preservation, and I had the pleasure of identifying it with the 

 Cygnus immutabilis of Yarrell. From enquiries which I made, I 

 ascertained that the bird was one of a pack of eight Swans seen 

 off Hauxley, and was wounded by some fisherman ; and that it 

 subsequently found its way to the river Aln, to fall to the guns 

 of two Alnmouth sportsmen ; so that in all probability, arguing 

 from the hypothesis that " birds of a feather flock together," the 

 eight birds seen off Hauxley were all Polish Swans. In the 

 Polish Swan, when adult, as exemplified in the bird recently 

 shot, the nail, lateral margins, nostrils, and base of the upper 

 mandible of the bill and lore are black, the remaining parts 

 reddish orange. The elongated opening of the nostrils does not 

 reach the black colour of the base of the upper mandible, as is 

 the case in the Mute Swan, another member of the genus Cygnus, 

 but is surrounded by the orange colour. It has also a small 

 tubercle at the base of the upper mandible of the bill, not unlike 

 that possessed by the Mute Swan, but in comparison with which 

 this is very small, and might be denominated rudimentary. The 

 legs, toes, and interdigital membranes, unlike all of the other 

 British Swans, are a pale slate grey. The windpipe is not con- 

 voluted, but simply descends between the branches of the 

 forked bone, and forming a circle, passes to the bone of 

 divarication, and thence by the bronchial tubes to the lungs. 

 The Polish Swan is said to be a native of the high northern 

 regions, and the Baltic, and occasionally visits our island. The 

 Cygnets, or immature birds, are also stated to be white in 

 plumage, and never change, and hence the name adopted by 

 Yarrell [Cygnus immutabilis). Continental naturalists, says 

 Newman, in a foot note to Montagu's description of the 

 Polish Swan in his "Dictionary of British Birds," have not 

 adopted it as distinct from the Mute Swan ; but Morris 

 thinks, and we imagine with every show of reason " that the 

 fact of the young having been procured in different 



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