38 
The Natural History of British Ducks 
THE WIGEON 
/ 
Mareca Penelope (LlNN^US). 
The Wigeon ranges throughout Europe during the seasons of periodical 
movement. It breeds in all the northern districts of the Continent, in 
Iceland, the Siberian Islands, and probably in East Greenland, although its 
nest has not yet been taken there. According to Dresser, the Wigeon occurs 
in Asia as far east as Japan, and it is found sparingly on both the east and 
west coasts of Canada and America, its place being taken in the centre of the 
New World by the nearly allied Mareca Americana. 
In winter the Wigeon is common in Turkey, Palestine, and southern 
Spain, and it doubtless occurs at this season amongst the great flights of duck 
which occasionally visit Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco. The actual limits of 
its southern range are not well known ; and it probably does not go so far south 
as the Pintail and the Mallard. Certainly the species is scarce in Egypt, 
though it is known to have occurred as far south as Nubia and the Red Sea 
littoral. Ruppell has also recorded it from Abyssinia. 
Faber first noted the nesting of Wigeon in Iceland, and said that it is not 
so common there as the Pintail ; a statement with which I do not agree, for 
either the distribution of these ducks in that island has materially altered 
within the last ten years, or his observations were confined to one small 
district. I found the Wigeon much commoner than the Pintail, and, generally, 
though sparsely, distributed throughout the island ; whereas in Myvatn, where 
the Pintails breed, the Wigeon outnumber this species by ten to one. In the 
south of Iceland, however, the Wigeon seems only to occur on migration. I 
saw two or three parties of them on the Sorg river in August, 1891, whilst 
