Common Pochard 
17 
The male has a fairly large windpipe, which is the same width throughout. At the 
point of division into two channels there is a drum or excrescence of bone of which the 
larger part on the left side is more angular than round. It has two apertures in the 
skin divided by a bent bone, but the smaller more round-shaped right side has only 
one small aperture. Weight, 2 lb. 2 oz. to 2 lb. 8 oz. 
Adult Female. — Forehead and crown, dark brown, becoming fulvous brown at the 
back of the cheeks and hind-neck ; cheeks and fore part of the neck, fulvous grey. In 
very old females the cheeks and neck become reddish brown and the chin yellowish 
white. I have killed two bearing these characters. Hind-neck and upper mantle, reddish- 
brown ; lower mantle, scapulars, and flanks, grey vermiculated with blackish-brown ; 
rump, brownish-black ; greyish-black round the vent, becoming whitish-grey on the under 
tail-coverts ; the breast and under parts vary a good deal in individuals, some being a 
greyish-white all over, others showing much dark grey on the central parts of the feathers ; 
tail and wings are similar to the male, only duller and darker. 
Irides, dull yellow, sometimes brown ; bill, similar to the male but not so bright, the 
crescentic blue mark more restricted ; legs and feet similar to male but duller. 
Length, 17.25 to 18 inches; wing, 8 to 8.3 inches; tarsus, 1.4 to 1.5 inch; bill, 2 to 
2.2 inches. " Weight, i lb. 5 oz. to 2 lb. 4 oz." (Hume). 
During the nesting season and until the end of August the adult female Pochard 
undergoes a considerable change of plumage all over the breast and chest, which is now 
brown-grey with broad white edges to the feathers; the head and neck, too, become a 
warm reddish-brown with fine grey edges to the feathers on neck and cheek. Except for 
the back, scapulars, and under tail-coverts, it is not easy to distinguish the female at 
this season from the male in eclipse. 
Immature Female. — In first plumage the young female resembles the young male 
but is somewhat paler in colour, especially on the cheeks and throat. In October the 
adult plumage of the female begins to come in and proceeds gradually until the end of 
March, at which date it is complete. Young female Pochards will mate and breed in the 
first spring, but their plumage, like that of the male, is not in full beauty until the third 
year. 
General Distribution. — The Common Pochard is found generally throughout Europe 
and the temperate parts of Asia, including China, but does not extend to the Arctic 
regions. Throughout Central Europe, the British Isles, both sides of the Baltic, and east 
to the Black Sea and the temperate portions of Siberia, east to Spain, and north to Cyprus 
and North Africa, the Common Pochard is locally abundant. We find them nesting or 
in migration in large or small numbers according to the suitability or otherwise of the 
summer or winter habitat. There is not the least doubt that in Germany and the British 
Isles the species is rapidly increasing and extending its breeding range every year. 
Breeding Range : Ettrope. — The breeding habitat of the duck is chiefly in the Palse- 
arctic region from the British Isles to Lake Baikal, and probably even further to the east. 
Russia. — To 60° N., in the Petersburg Government, the Jaroslav, Kazan and S. Perm 
Governments, and near Tjumen (Buturlin in Dresser's Eggs of Birds of Europe, p. 567), 
Baltic Province (Russow), in the Government of Moscow (/. F. O., 1909, p. 585), 
Finland, on Aland, and a few localities N. to lat. 63° (Dresser). 
VOL. I. c 
