THE RED -THROATED DIVER. 473 



Pood. — Mainly fish, including roach, Gobius, trout, etc. ; also 

 Crustacea (crabs and prawns). Naumann also includes frogs as 

 rarely taken. 



Distribution. — British Isles. — Resident and winter -visitor (mid- 

 Oct. to May). Breeds in small numbers Perth, Argyll, and more 

 commonly Inverness, Ross, Sutherland, Caithness and O. Hebrides, 

 and occasionally Skye and Orkneys. To Shetlands very rare 

 visitor, but has possibly bred. Elsewhere uncommon winter- 

 visitor and rarest of the Divers (except C. adamsii). Especially 

 rare west coast England and Wales and in Ireland. Rare vagrant 

 inland. 



Distribution. — Abroad. — Scandinavia, Finland, northern Russia, 

 Baltic provinces and north-eastern Germany as far as Brandenburg 

 (rare). In winter south to Mediterranean and Black Sea. Casual 

 Iceland, Faeroes, Spitsbergen, Novaya Zemlia, Kolguev (probably 

 this form). Replaced by allied subspecies in western Siberia and 

 Turkestan (suschkini) (probably Caspian in winter), western and 

 eastern N. America (pacificus), and north-eastern Siberia and Alaska 

 (viridigularis). 



COLYMBUS STELLATUS 



359. Colymbus stellatus Pont oppidan— THE RED -THROATED 

 DIVER. 



Colymbus stellatus Pontoppidan, Danske Atlas, 1, p. 621 (1763 — Ex 



Willughby, pi. 62. Denmark). 



Mergus NceviaTunsta,\l, On. Brit., p. 3 (1771 — Great Britain. Ex " Grey 



Speckled Diver " Pennant, Brit. Z00L, and " Petit Plongeon " Brisson, 



On., vi, p. 108). 



Colymbus septentrionalis Linnaeus, Yarrell, iv, p. 112 ; Saunders, p. 715. 



Description. — Adult male and female. Winter. — Whole crown 

 and back of neck blackish-grey, finely streaked white (each feather 

 with blackish centre and grey edges with short narrow white streak 

 on each side at tip) ; rest of upper-parts brown-black closely 

 spotted white (each feather having at tip pair of small white spots 

 well separated and of slightly oblong shape, on scapulars almost 

 rectangular and set obliquely with usually an additional pair of 

 spots proximal to them) ; under -parts white, including lower part 

 of lores, under eye, and side of neck, feathers joining back of neck 

 tipped blackish and giving mottled appearance which occasionally 

 extends on to throat, sides of upper-breast and flanks more or less 

 streaked black and white and also spotted, feathers having black 

 centres and white edges and often white spots ; from side to side 

 across vent narrow and somewhat ill-defined dark line, feathers 

 being brown with white tips ; under tail-coverts white, lower ones 

 with basal halves dark brown ; axillaries white with black-brown 

 median streaks ; under wing-coverts white, those covering prim- 

 aries with pale brown shaft-streaks ; tail-feathers brown-black, 

 narrowly and evenly tipped white ; primaries brown-black on outer 



