SOUTH AFRICAN SHOVELLER 41 



DISTRIBUTION 



The Cape Shoveller seems to be confined to South Africa. In the west it has been found as far north 

 as Rio Coroca, Mossamedes (Barboza de Bocage, 1877-81), but in Damaraland and Great Namaqua- 

 land it is comparatively scarce (Andersson, 1872). In Cape Colony it has been met with in the Cape 

 Division, at Yerloren Ylei, on Berg River and on Vogel Vlei, in Paarl, Knysna (Layard, 1875-84). 

 Richard (in Layard, 1875-84) has recorded it from Port Elizabeth, and Griffith (ibid.), who says it is 

 rare in the eastern part of Cape Colony, met with it at Queenstown. C. G. Davies (1908) has recorded 

 it from eastern Griqualand. Ayres (British Museum) met with the species at Durban, Natal, and 

 E. A. Butler, Feilden and Reid (1882) saw a pair east of Newcastle. Murray (Stark and Sclater, 

 1906) found it near Mafeteng in Basutoland. B. Horsbrugh (1912) says he has several times shot 

 specmens in the Orange River Colony, especially near Bloemfontein. He never found the species in 

 the Transvaal, though Ayres (fide Stark and Sclater, 1906) has recorded it from there. There are 

 no records for Rhodesia, but Bryden (1893) came across it on the Botletle River, Bechuanaland. 



Perhaps single specimens sometimes straggle to the northeast. Lefebvre's statement (Voy. Abyss., 

 Oiseaux, p. 172, 1845-50) that it occurs in Abyssinia gains color from B. Horsbrugh's (1912) asser- 

 tion that he shot a fine male from a flock of European Shovellers in British East Africa. 



GENERAL 



This, the last and by far the rarest and least known of the Shovellers, has a very 

 restricted range, almost as limited as that of the South African Sheldrake. B. Hors- 

 brugh (1912) is of the opinion that it is a bird of shy and wary habits; but this, I 

 think, may refer to its retiring nature rather than to its actual wildness, for none of 

 the Shovellers can be called exactly wild or wary. Practically nothing is known of the 

 life-history of this species. Horsbrugh found them always in pairs, and noted that 

 their manner of feeding was exactly the same as that of the Common Shoveller. He 

 also observed the curious trick of swimming swiftly round and round in small circles 

 in shallow water, all the while sifting mud and small insects stirred up by the rotary 

 action. He considers them much faster on the wing than the Yellow-billed Duck or 

 the South African Pochard, and says they would come through flocks of the latter 

 "like race-horses." 



Of the nesting habits we know nothing beyond the fact that a set of eggs taken on 

 the Berg River are of a delicate cream color tinged with green, and measure 54.9 by 

 38.1 mm. (Layard, 1875-84). 



The Cape Shoveller has never been imported alive into Europe or America. 



