CATALOGUE OP CANADIAN BIRDS. I23 



LXVI. ANSER Brisson. 1760. 

 171. White-fronted Goose. 



Anser alhifrons (Gmel.) Bechst. 1809. 

 Casual in Eastern Greenland? {A. 0. U. List.) 



171a. American White-fronted Goose. Laughing Goose. 



Anser alhifrons gambeli (Hartl.) Coues. 1872. 



Not rare in fresh water between lat. 66° and 68° 30' N. in west 

 Greenland. (Arct. Man.) I received one specimen shot at Hope- 

 dale, Labrador. So far as I can learn it is the only record. (Bigelow.) 

 Figured from a specimen procured from Hudson bay. Bamstpn 

 says that this species is seldom seen in the southern part of Hudson 

 bay, but is less rare at York Factory and is frequent at Fort Churchill. 

 (Preble.) Very rare around Newfoundland. (Reeks.) This species 

 has been noted at Montreal, and one was shot at Lac Jacques Car- 

 tier, north of Quebec, in the autumn of 1870. (Dionne.) A friend 

 and myself came across three individuals of this species on the Isle 

 de la Paix, Lake St. Louis, near Montreal, but failed to secure speci- 

 mens. (Winlle.) Only a casual visitor in Ontario. 



From the middle of April, or a week later, to the middle of May 

 this species is quite common in western Manitoba and eastern Sas- 

 katchewan. It is then passing to its breeding places which Richard- 

 son says are in the wooded districts, skirting the Mackenzie river 

 to the north of the 67th parallel, and the islands in the Arctic sea. 

 Macfarlane found it breeding on Franklin bay, Murdoch at Point 

 Barrow, Dall all along the Yukon, and Turner in its delta. Nelson 

 along the Arctic coast, and Fannin says it breeds on the mainland 

 of British Columbia, and that young fledglings have been taken on 

 Cowichan lake, Vancouver island. The breeding range of this bird 

 is therefore the whole northwestern part of the continent and its 

 peculiar spring migration accounted for. 



Breeding Notes. — A clutch of four eggs in my collection was 

 taken on an island in Mackenzie bay, west of the mouth of Mackenzie 

 river, June 5th, 1895. The nest consisted of a hollow in the sand 

 lined with down. (Raine.) When the white-fronted goose frst 

 arrives in the north, the lakes are but just beginning to open and the 



