499 



and in America, from Alaska down to Costa Rica. In Great Britain it is tolerably common during 

 the winter season ; and a few breed with us. Mr. More states that " Mr. Thompson mentions a 

 nest found in Dorset. Yarrell tells us that the Shoveller formerly bred in the Romney Marsh. 

 It still breeds occasionally in Norfolk ; and Mr. F. Bond has found the nest in Staffordshire. 

 Canon Tristram states that it breeds occasionally in Durham ; and Mr. Hancock marks it as 

 breeding regularly in Northumberland." Mr. Stevenson informs me that " it visits Norfolk in 

 winter in small numbers, even in the sharpest weather (a fact I have only noticed of late years) ; 

 and it still nests with us in some few localities on our ' Broads' and ' Meres,' but is scarce in 

 summer as compared with the Garganey Teal." Mr. Cordeaux records it as " by no means rare 

 in the Humber district, as may be inferred from the fact that between the years 1833-34 to 

 1867-68, thirty-five years, 285 were taken on the small decoy of Ashby-on-the-Trent, North 

 Lincolnshire. The largest number captured in any one year was in the winter of 1860-61, 

 namely 34. These, however, represent only a portion of the Shovellers visiting the Ashby pond 

 during that period, as many of the flocks would leave again without entering the nets. In the 

 winter of 1868-69 a flock of sixteen, principally males, frequented the decoy waters for some 

 days, and none of them were captured. 



" Mr. Boulton has had several specimens shot on the river Hull, and says that it has occa- 

 sionally been known to breed amongst the sedgy and more retired portion of that river, and 

 would do so more frequently but for the too numerous gunners which frequent the towing-path. 

 The Ducks, I am told by those who .have had opportunities of watching them, have a curious 

 habit of swimming round and round each other in circles, with the head and neck depressed to 

 the surface of the water ; this they will do for hours together." Speaking of its range in Scotland, 

 Mr. Robert Gray states that it " has frequently occurred in the west of Scotland ; one, a fine 

 male, which I had an opportunity of examining, was shot in a small stream near Girvan, in May 

 1860 ; another, also a male, was shot in Possil Marsh, near Glasgow, on 24th May, 1869 ; a 

 third, the male bird of a pair, was killed on the Gryfe, near Inchinnan, Renfrewshire, in the 

 first week of June, 1870. The Shoveller has likewise been met with several times on Loch 

 Lomond, chiefly in severe winters ; and a pair, male and female, were shot on the Cree, in 

 Wigtownshire, in the spring of 1865. Several were killed on the Nith, in Dumfriesshire, in 1850, 

 1851, and were preserved by Mr. Hastings, bird-stuffer, Dumfries. 



" Some of my Hebridean correspondents have, at various times, sent me word of ducks with 

 broad bills; but I have never obtained a specimen from the outer islands, nor have I been able to 

 get the species sufficiently authenticated there. Mr. Elwes informs me that it is a rare winter 

 visitor in Islay. 



" Having seen numbers of Shovellers shot on the Ribble, in Lancashire, early in May, and 

 traced the migratory flight of the species northwards to the Solway Firth, thence in an easterly 

 direction through the counties of Berwick, East Lothian, Fife, Forfar, and Kincardine, to 

 Aberdeen, I conclude that the breeding-haunts of the species must lie somewhere to the north- 

 east of the British Islands, and that in migrating northwards along the west coast of England, 

 the flocks are tempted to diverge from their course by the trending of the Solway. A few of the 

 Shovellers which cross the firth probably remain to breed; indeed in one instance Sir George 

 Leith shot a female and found the nest in Dumbartonshire ; and it is not unlikely that the pair 



