104 GEOLOGICAL SyRVEY OF CANADA. 



their destinjition the flocks disband and the birds quietly pair, 

 but the first eggs are rarely laid earlier than the first of June. 

 Most of my eggs were taken fresh between the loth and 20th of 

 this month, and I obtained the young just out of the egg on July 

 23rd. When first paired the birds choose a pond in a marsh, 

 and are henceforth found in its vicinity until the young are 

 hatched. When the grass commences to show green and the snow 

 and ice are nearly gone, these ducks choose some dry, grassy 

 spot close to a pond, and making a slight hollow with a warm 

 lining of grass, they commence the duties of the season, al- 

 though the other denizens of the marsh are already well on with 

 their house-keeping. One nest found on June 15th was on abed 

 of dry grass on the border of the pond, within a foot of the 

 water, and when the female flew off, the single egg could be seen 

 20 yards away. Tussocks of dry grass, small islands ixi ponds, 

 and knolls close to the water's edge are all chosen as nesting 

 places, and as a rule the nest is well concealed by the dry grass 

 standing about. The eggs usually number from five to eight or 

 nine in a set and are small for the size of the bird. In colour 

 they are of a light olive-drab. {Nelson. 



LXI. SOMATERIA Leach. i8iq. 



159. Greenland Eider. Northern Eider. 



Somateria mollissima borealis C. L. Brehm. 1830. 



Common along all the coasts of Greenland ; northern limit 

 unknown. {Arct. Man.) A resident at Ivigtut and very abundant. 

 {Hagerup) Abundant in Hudson Strait ; breeds in Ungava Bay. 

 {Packard.) 



160. American Eider. 



Somateria dresseri Sharpe. 1871. 



The most abundant species of duck in Newfoundland, but 

 rapidly growing scarce owing to the destruction of eggs. {Reeks.) 

 Common. Breeds on Isle Haut, Bay of Fundy. Downs.) 

 Common in winter on the south coast of Labrador, in the Gulf 

 of St. Lawrence, and up the St. Lawrence to Quebec. {Dionne.) 

 Eider Ducks in immature plumage, which I take to be th,is species, 

 have been occasionally shot at Montreal in the fall. {Winile.') 

 Common in Hudson Strait, and seen at York Factory and Churchill 



