SEA DTTKS 



(160) Somateria dresseri Sharpe 

 (Gr., body, wool, in reference to cider down). 

 EIDER; SEA DRAKE cf; SEA 

 DUCK 9 . Bill with a broad, round- 

 ended, lateral frontal process, ex- 

 tending on each side of the forehead. 

 Ad. cf and 9 — Plumage as shown, 

 the male being the upper bird. L., 

 24.00; W., 11.00; T., 4.00; Tar., 1.75; 

 B., 2.10. 



Range — Breeds from Me. to Un- 

 gava and on Hudson Bay. Winters 

 south to Mass. 

 (159) Somateria mollissima 

 borealis 



{Brchm). (Lat., very soft; nortliern}. 



NORTHERN EIDER. Frontal 

 process pointed. 



Range — Breeds on Hudson Bay, 

 Ungava and Greenland; rarely south 

 to Mass., in winter. 



the Atlantic coast from Maine to Newfoundland. They feed 

 upon small fish, mollusks and insects — this diet together 

 with their activity making their flesh tough and rank. 



LABRADOR DUCKS apparently never were abundant, 

 and it is said that neither Audubon nor Wilson ever saw 

 them alive. Between the years 1850 and 1870 gunners 

 along Long Island and Jersey coasts sometimes shot them 

 and they hung in the Fulton Market together with other 

 species. They were taken less and less often until 1875, 

 when the species apparently became extinct. 



EIDERS are probably known throughout our land, 

 but chiefly as a source from which the eider-down of com- 

 merce is procured. They are essentially sea-birds, rarely 

 found on fresh water. As they can procure their food 

 from very deep water, they find it necessary to migrate but 

 little to the south during winter. Two species of Atlantic 

 Eiders are practically alike in plumage, but differ in the shape 

 of the soft, basal portion of the bill that extends back on 



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