BIRDS. 



233 



Spatula clypeata (L.). Shoveller.^ 



Formerly rare. Increased and increasing. Resident. Breeding in 

 increasing numbers of late years. Becoming very generally distri- 

 buted in suitable situations on the shallower and reedier lochs of the 

 east. 



^ In the form of a footnote here, it may not be out of place to give a short Hsum4, 

 of the earlier history of the bird in Scotland, and in Britain. Our earlier authors 

 appear to be agreed, for the most part, that the Shoveller occurred rarely, and princi- 

 pally in the eastern parts of Britain in the winter, and that a few remained to breed 

 in the marshes of Xorfolk ; but we have no early records of its nesting in North 

 Britain, and, down to the time of Macgillivray's writing, there is no appearance of its 

 having been added to our list of nesting species. 



When Gray wrote, certain indications were presented regarding their lines of flight 

 in passing. As that author says : "Having traced the migratory flight of the species 

 northwards (from Lancashire to the Solway Firth) and thence in an easterly direction 

 through the counties of Berwick, East Lothian, to Fife, Kinross, Kincardine, and Aber- 

 deen, I conclude that the breeding haunts of species must lie someivhere to the north- 

 ea-s' of the British Islands, and that in migrating northwards along the west coast of 

 England the flocks are tempted to swerve from their course by the trend of the 

 Solway." Mr. Gray then records the nesting of the Shoveller in Fossil Marsh, near 

 Glasgow, and also in Renfrewshire, Wigtownshire, and Loch Lomond, but denies it as 

 present in the Outer Hebrides, and only a rare winter visitor to Islay. 



Coming to still later accounts, we now know that its distribution has been very 

 fairly worked out as regards its continental range (aifc^. Dresser, Saunders, etc.). It 

 is still spoken of as "scarce in our southern and western counties," but as "appearing 

 to be resident in our eastern side of England" ; and, on the authority of Mr. South- 

 well, "although not so generally distributed as formerly, breeds regularly in various 

 parts of the county" {v. Lubbock's Fauna of Norfolk). In Scotland, records of nesting 

 only reach us from the southern counties, and casual occurrences from localities north 

 of Forth and Clyde, as only once obtained in Orkney, and not found in the Shetlands 

 nor in the Outer Hebrides. 



We take Dresser's account as the latest and fullest as regards the distribution on 

 the Continent, and without going into minutice, that clearly shows its limits there to be 

 confined to south-west of Norway, where it is not common, and as far north as 62° N. 

 Lat., and then across a band of country which stretches across Lakes Ladoga and Onega 

 to Archangel. Seebohm and the present writer found that line continued even further 

 north upon the islands of the Petchora river in north-east Russia, and to within the 

 Arctic Circle. 



I have no intention here to insist upon any general principle about the dispersal of 

 species, lest I be accused of " massage," etc. ; but I only give this as a further instance 

 of what I have always maintained, viz. that the migrations of birds precede their 

 establishment as breeding species ; and that any one studying either or both of the 

 phenomena of migration and dispersal cannot afi"ord to despise what I have always 

 advocated, viz. chronological recording, and it is principally because we have not 

 had this done by our earlier authors, that we find so much difficulty now (a.d. 1905 !) 

 in studying them. 



