BAER'S POCHARD 211 



Adult Female: Similar to the male but head and neck less glossy; a chestnut patch on the anterior 

 part of the face, near the base of the bill; upper breast of a duller chestnut, dark brown, without nar- 

 row wavy lines; brown base of the abdominal feathers more extended (Salvadori, 1895). The eye is 

 said to be darker than in the male (Finn, 1901), gray or brown. Perhaps it is white in old females 

 (Baker, 1921). The bill and feet are not so bright in color as in the male. 



Immature, both sexes: Very similar to adult females. 



Male in Eclipse: Males in captivity did not "go off" in color to any appreciable extent according to 

 Finn (1901). In another place (1909) he says that his males in "undress" assume the rusty facial 

 patch and get some white mottling on the breast. At this time also the white appears to "fade" off 

 the flanks in both sexes. 



Downy Young: Not examined. 



DISTRIBUTION 



A very few words will suffice to tell what is known of the distribution of this duck. It is probably not 

 so rare a bird as our meager data would suggest, because it must often have been overlooked on ac- 

 count of its resemblance to the Common White-eyed Duck. It appears to have been v . . 

 found in 1825 in Kamchatka by Kittlitz (Oken's Isis, 1829, p. 529) but no more recent 

 investigators seem to have met with it there. We know nothing of its summer status excepting that 

 it has been found in eastern Siberia, in southern Dauria (Transbaikalia), at the mouth Eastern 

 of the Ussuri and on the Amur (Taczanowski, 1893) and on the Udir and the right bank Siberia 

 of the middle Amur (Radde, 1863). The species is said to occur in Yezo (Seebohm, J a pan 

 1890), but whether in the breeding season or only in winter is not clear. One specimen China 

 was taken in Manchuria on May 15 (Bianchi, 1902). 



In winter it is found in parts of China, and is particularly common about Peking (David and 

 Oustalet, 1877; H. A. Walton, 1903). It is irregular and not very common on the lower Yangtse 

 (Styan, 1891) though specimens have been taken at Kinkiang and Shanghai every winter 

 (David and Oustalet, 1877; British Museum). La Touche (1922) got one in the Shasi market in 

 Hupeh Province of China in late February while Mr. E. H. Wilson told me of seeing the species on the 

 Tung River around Kiating-fu in Szechuan. Kuroda (1918) has recorded it for Korea, and examples 

 have also been taken near Foochow (La Touche, 1917; Kellogg, 1919). In Japan it is T 

 found on the main island and south to Yokohama (Seebohm, 1890), but, as Mr. Kuroda 

 writes me, it is never anything but a very rare visitor in his country. As identification of females and 

 immature birds is not easy it is possible that most of the records of the Common White-eye in east- 

 ern China and Japan really refer to Baer's Pochard. 



Finn (1909) has shown that this species has occurred in northwestern India as long ago as 1825, 

 and he has carefully noted specimens taken since 1896. It appears that the species may be found each 

 year in Bengal, and that it has been procured also in Cachar, Sylhet, Manipur, Burma T ,. 

 and Arakan (Hopwood, 1912; Baker, 1921). H. J. Walton (1906) says he inspected „ 

 large numbers of ducks in southern Tibet both in summer and in autumn and saw no 

 trace of this species. 



It remains to note two occurrences of this Pochard in England : one a young male taken on Novem- 

 ber 5, 1901, on the Tring Reservoir (Hartert and Jourdain, 1920) and one taken on the Trent River, 

 Nottinghamshire, in the middle of April, 1911 (J. Whitaker, 1913). Since the species „ . . 

 has not been commonly kept in England or on the Continent and since no loss was re- 

 ported, it seems that the first of these two specimens, at least, may have been a wild bird. 



