ANATIDE. 429 
Ah 
THE PINTAIL. 
DAFiLa acuta (Linneus). 
This slender and elegant Duck—locally known from the length 
of its tail as the ‘Sea Pheasant”—is a regular visitor to Great 
Britain, from September onwards. In the northern districts it 
seldom lingers long, while its numbers on the east coast are subject 
to considerable variation, and on the west it is rather uncommon ; 
its principal resorts being our southern shores and estuaries, though 
its appearance on inland waters is not unusual. As a rule the 
Pintail leaves us in April; but in the east of Scotland it has now 
established itself as a breeding-species, six or seven pairs of birds 
and four of their nests having been discovered on Loch Leven this 
summer by Mr. W. Evans (Ann. Scott. Nat. Hist:, 1898, p. 162). 
In the west the Pintail is rare, though there is some evidence that it 
has bred in the Hebrides, and it is uncommon in the Orkneys 
and Shetlands. To the south and west of Ireland it is a winter- 
visitor, and it is said to have nested, exceptionally, at Abbeyleix in 
Queen’s County, but on the whole it is local and not numerous. In 
spring its numbers are increased by migrants from the south. 
The Pintail has nested in the Feeroes, and is generally distributed 
in Iceland during the summer months, sometimes wandering to 
Greenland. It breeds abundantly in the northern portions of 
Europe ; in tolerable numbers in Holland ; and, decreasingly, down 
