LONG-TAILED DUCK. .",57 



LONG-TAILED DUCK. 



Harelda glacialis. 



This is a winter visitant^ and is most numerous on our 

 coast during a long continuance of severe weather, and is by- 

 no means common, although small flocks are occasionally met 

 with in the Channel. It feeds on fish, mollusks, Crustacea, 

 and freshwater insects. Its note is loud and musical, and may 

 be represented by the word " calloo ; " during the breeding, 

 season it is very pugnacious, often fighting with its com- 

 panions. It does not breed in Britain. The nests were found 

 by Messrs. Shepherd and Upcher, on a small island in Lake 

 Myvatn in Iceland, and were placed among low bushes by the 

 edge of fresh water, and composed of grass, with a thick lining 

 of down (see Yarrell, B. B. vol. iv. p. 449) . 



In my own notes I find a female Long-tailed Duck was 

 obtained near Hailsham, in the winter of 1849-50. Mr. 

 Knox (B. B. p. 346) says :^"I shot a young male at Pagham 

 Harbour, out of a flock of Scaup Ducks (1839). Immature 

 specimens have occurred on other parts of the coast, near 

 Chichester, Brighton, and Pevensey, and I have a specimen 

 which was shot as far inland as Amberley, in the hard winter 

 of 1844-5." 



Mr. Booth, in ' Rough Notes,' writes of these Ducks that 

 it is " only when the weather is severe that they favour the 

 flat sandy shores to the west of Brighton, in Sussex, with a 

 visit. In December 1879 and again in 1880 I remarked them 

 in greater numbers than usual. . . . Small parties of from six 

 to eight up to double that number are not unfrequently seen 

 in this part. On a fine still morning, in the last week of 

 December 1883, when the sea was as smooth as glass, I noticed 

 about a dozen, in company with as many Eiders, and some 



