98 MICHIGAN BIRD LIFE. 
member of the genus. Mr. Swales states (Birds of §. E. Mich., 1904) 
“T know little of this bird and have not met with it personally at the 
Flats or on Detroit River, or seen it in any of the ducker’s cabins. Purdy 
says ‘taken at Plymouth as a migrant.’” According to Chas. L. Cass 
this species remained at Hillsdale, Michigan, until November 26, 1894. 
Mr. L. Whitney Watkins has a specimen taken in Jackson county, April 
18, 1894, and there are two specimens, male and female, in the Agricultural 
College collection taken at Greenville, Montcalm county. 
According to the late Percy Selous “‘in June, 1896, a pair of Ring-necked 
Ducks spent weeks on Baldwin Lake (near Greenville), and probably 
were nesting.” Most of the public and private collections in the state 
have specimens of this duck, but it is certainly never common. 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Adult male: Head, neck, chest and back black, the chin with a snow-white triangular 
patch, and the lower neck encircled by a chestnut ring; the head and neck glossed with 
purplish, and the feathers of the occiput usually elongated, forming a dense, bushy, more 
or less erect crest. Lower breast and belly white; flanks finely cross-lined with white 
and dusky; rump and upper and under tail-coverts black. Speculum blue-gray, some- 
times very narrowly white-tipped. The black scapulars are sometimes minutely sprinkled 
with white. Bill black, bordered by white at the base, and crossed near the tip by a 
bluish-white band. Adult female: Similar only as to the speculum and wings. Head, 
neck, breast and back grayish-brown, deepest on the crown and neck, whitening to gray 
or soiled white about the base of the bill and on chin and throat; rump brownish-black ; 
lower breast and belly soiled whitish; hinder part of belly grayish-brown like breast; 
under tail-coverts gray. 
Length 15.50 to 18 incnes; wing 7 to 8 culmen 1.75 to 2. 
48. Whistler. Clangula clangula americana Bonap. (151) 
Synonyms: Golden-eye, American Golden-eye, Whistle-wing, Spirit Duck, Garrot. 
—Clangula americana, Bonap., 1838—Anas clangula, Linn., 1766, part.—Glaucion 
clangula, Kaup.—Clangula glaucion, Bonap.—Bucephala clangula, Coues, 1872. 
Figure 28, 
A large, handsome, black and white duck with a green-black head and a 
rounded spot of pure white on each side between eye and bill. The female 
has brown instead of black head, and other dark parts slaty gray instead 
of black; no white cheek spot. 
Distribution.—North America, breeding 
from Maine and the British Provinces north- 
ward; in winter south to Cuba and Mexico. 
The Whistler or Golden-eye is one of the 
best known ducks in the state, yet appar- 
ently is nowhere very abundant. It does 
not spend the summer within our limits, 
and is late in arriving from the north, 
few coming before the first of November. 
Unless driven south by heavy ice some 
af them stay all winter. Even at Sault 
Ste. Marie, where the river remains open 
on account of the swift current, Mr. W. Fig. 23. Whistler. From Bailey’s 
P. Melville says that they are found all  fanen goede of the Wester 
winter. Butler states that on southern Lake  & Co.) 
Michigan this is the common winter duck, 
