THE PIUNK-WEADED DUCK. 
0 
Rhodonessa caryophyllacea, Latham. 
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Vernacular Names.--[Saknal, (Bengali); Lal-sira, (Hindustani) ; Doomrar, 
Nepal Terai ; Doomar, Domar, Zirhoot ; ] 
o-——_—_- == 
<5 ESPITE strenuous efforts I have been quite unable 
* to clear up conclusively the question of the 
distribution of the Pink-headed Duck. 
I have no record of its occurrence in Ceylon or 
the Madras districts south of Mysore, or in this 
latter, or in the Konkan, Gujarat; Cutch, Kathiawar, 
Sindh, Rajputana, the Central India Agency, or 
Central Provinces. 
In the Punjab I only certainly* know of its having been once 
procured, and that near Delhi, in the easternmost portion of 
the Province. In the Doab and Rohilkhand, of the North- 
Western Provinces, it is so excessively rare that during nearly 
twenty years’ fowling I never once saw or heard of it; but 
Anderson shot one female near Fatehpur, and a writer in the 
Asian professes to have obtained them in the Dun and at 
Bareilly.f In the western portions of Oudh it is outside the 
* Major Alexander Kinloch writes :—‘‘I shot two Pink-headed Ducks on the 
banks of the canal leading to the Najjafgarh jhil, near Delhi, during the winter of 
1862-63, and a brother officer shot another.” 
Mr. R. W. Rumsby ¢inks that he once shot it on an exposed jhil south-west 
of Umballa, and also in the Gurdaspur district; but on further investigation he is 
clearly not certain of the species. No one else that I can hear of ¢hinwks even that 
they have procured it in the Punjab. Adams never met with it there; neither 
have I myself, nor any one of the very numerous friends who have collected 
there for me (some of them for years and most exhaustively), so that I can only (at 
present), consider it as a rare and accidental straggler during the cold season into the 
easternmost portions of the Punjab, Cis-Satlej. 
+ It is impossible to attach much weight to anonymous communications by writers 
who admit knowing very little of birds. Still I quote what was said, guwantum 
valeat :— 
‘«* Some time before Christmas, I was out shooting in the Dun, and accidentally 
came across the very bird, I think, he means. There were only five, and I shot two of 
them—a male and a female. Had I known that it would have been of any use I 
would have preserved them, but now alas! they have been eaten, for, as Jerdon says, 
they are ‘excellent eating,’ and I knewthat. These birds I found ina large pool, 
formed in the river Asun, made for irrigation purposes. It wasSa very cold morning, 
for the night before the water froze in my tent. These Ducks I have come across 
“but seldom in the North-West Provinces, principally about Delhi and Bareilly. At 
the former place I have often bagged 50 head of !)ucks, but it was rarely I found one 
or two of the pink-headed among the bag. Ido not think I can be mistaken in the 
bird, Although I am not a naturalist, I follow Jerdon’s description.” 
