TOWNSEND AND ALLEN: LABRADOR BIRDS. 337 



American Eider. They both fly in flocks, and as a rule the two 

 species do not mingle (Stearns). Under date of April 7, 1775, at 

 Charles Harbor, Cartwright records: "Also one flock of King-ducks, 

 which are the first I have heard of this year." It is found in winter 

 if there is any open water. 



We saw only two King Eiders on the Labrador coast. The first 

 was an adult male on the shore at the mouth of St. Louis Inlet on 

 July 13th. As we approached in a sail-boat he waddled down to the 

 water and swam off. His light color and cocked up tail suggested a 

 gull, but with glasses we could make out the characteristic spectacle 

 side-face markings and projection over the bill. In flight he showed 

 dark on his back posteriorly and light wings. In diving he opened 

 his wings for subaqueous flight. The second bird, apparently in 

 immature plumage, was seen between Fanny's Harbor and Nain. 



Oidemia americana Swains. 

 American Scoter; "Butter-bill Coot." 



Common transient visitor, rare summer resident. 



As all the Scoters are frequently found in summer sometimes in 

 considerable numbers far south of their breeding grounds even to the 

 Massachusetts and Rhode Island coast, it is never safe to record the 

 breeding range of these birds except by the discovery of their nests, 

 eggs, or ducklings. Cooke ('06, p. 59) says of this bird: "The lack of 

 information in regard to the breeding of this species in northeastern 

 North America is surprising. The species was described from the west 

 shore of Hudson Bay, and occurs on the coasts of Labrador and the 

 Gulf of St. Lawrence, but there seems to be no record of the discovery 

 of the nest in this region. Nonbreeding birds are known to occur far 

 south of the breeding grounds. The species is unknown from the 

 whole vast interior of North America, between Hudson Bay on the 

 east and the Yukon Valley on the west, and south almost to the 

 United States boundary; it ranges north to Ungava Bay, Hudson 

 Strait, and Fort Churchill, Hudson Bay, and apparently does not 

 breed south of Newfoundland, nor in Labrador south of about latitude 

 52°; so that it follows by exclusion that the multitudes of. these ducks 

 that winter from the Gulf of St. Lawrence south along the Atlantic 

 coast must breed in northern Ungava. 



"The American scoter is much more abundant on the Pacific coast, 



