Lesser White-fronted Goose 65 



proved to be inaccurate, and for the same reason, namely, that Naumann undoubtedly tried 

 to guess the colour of the bill of A. albifrons from dry skins, while the live birds seen 

 by him in Potsdam had bills of a beautiful rosy colour. The reader will have seen that I 

 had to dispute the existence of normally orange bills in the case of the grey-lag (Anser 

 anser), and, as it seems to me, not unsuccessfully. The same has happened here, and I am 

 obliged to absolutely deny the existence of orange colouring of the bill in the living 

 European lesser white-fronted goose. 



Unfortunately I have to regret that when I lived in Taganrog, where the lesser 

 white-fronted goose passes in autumn in vast numbers, I did not note exactly the colouring 

 of the bills of the individuals which came into my hands, some of which I shot myself, and 

 some of which were bought ; but I am convinced that if they really had orange bills, such 

 a circumstance would hardly have escaped my attention. 



So far as I remember, the colouring of the bill of freshly killed white-fronted geese of 

 the greater and lesser species, which more than once I examined together, in general showed 

 no marked differences, which would have been striking were the bill of the smaller species 

 orange. The few specimens of lesser white- fronted geese which I have had the opportunity 

 of seeing the day after being killed, either from Finland or the Novgorod Government, had 

 bills absolutely dark flesh-coloured. I particularly well remember two examples, one from 

 Finland (Vyborg Government), an old gander, with confluent black patches on belly, which 

 had a bright rosy flesh-coloured bill, and the other, a male from the neighbourhood of 

 Novgorod, with a rosy white bill, whose skin served as the original for Mr. Frohawk's 

 drawing in Plate 5 of this work. 



According to Dr. Sushkin, "the bill in the lesser white-fronted goose, as in the 

 kazarka, is of a beautiful and pure rose-red colour (peach-blossom). The depth of this 

 colour varies, and is, it seems, connected with the afflux or reflux of blood (do not confuse 

 this phenomenon with extravasation, which occurs only in consequence of a wound in the 

 bill or its neighbourhood). Sometimes the bill is very pale. In A. minutus I have not 

 seen an orange tinge on the bill." 1 This statement is thus to the effect that in European 

 birds of this species the bill is (if only occasionally, as is the case with the grey-lag) yellow 

 or orange ; but I have been unable to find, and therefore personally do not believe in, the 

 existence of such lesser white-fronted geese. 



These, then, are the reasons why I cannot recognise two separate geographical races 

 among lesser white-fronted geese, and therefore add A. rhodorhynchus, Buturlin, as a 

 synonym of A '. jinmarchicus, Gunner. 



A further very essential distinction between the greater and lesser white-fronted 

 species is the fact that, in the latter, the folded wings considerably overlap the tip of the 

 tail, which is especially clearly to be seen in live birds (as positively asserted by Mr. Finn), 

 while in living specimens of A . albifrons the tips of the wings only very slightly extend 

 beyond the limit of the tail-feathers, and more often do not reach their tips. I speak here 

 of live birds, as from dry skins or stuffed specimens it is far more difficult, or even almost 

 impossible, to judge of this point. 



With regard to the supposed somewhat larger dimensions of eastern examples, it 

 is to be presumed that this is only a consequence of the fact that a far less number of 

 western individuals have been measured than of the former. But even granted that the 



1 Here it must be borne in mind that the lesser white-fronted goose is known to Dr. Sushkin not only from the Turgai district 

 but also from the Ryazan Government. 



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