BIRDS OF DUMFRIESSHIRE 
Mr. W. Nichol writes me that he saw six Velvet-Scoters 
off the Dumfriesshire coast on June 10th, 1908. 
This species breeds in northern Europe and parts of 
western Siberia, and it has possibly bred in the northern 
Highlands of Scotland ; in winter it visits the Baltic, North 
Sea and the waters of western Europe, and is more rarely 
found on the Adriatic, Black and Caspian Seas. 
THE GOOSANDER. Mergus merganser, Linnaeus. 
Local names— Saw-nbb ; Saw-nebbed Duck ; Sawbill; 
Stockannet ; Stockgander ; Dun Diver (of female and 
immature male). 
A winter.vi.itor of lest marine habitat than most of the diving duck*. 
Sir William Jardine, writing of the birds of the parish of 
Applegarth and Sibbaldbie in 1832, says of the Goosander: 
" Male and female ascend the Annan during winter in small 
flocks. Those of immature plumage and females are most 
abundant."* This observation still holds good, and the 
full-plumaged adult males, are but rarely seen compared 
with the more sober-coloured females and immature males. 
For the first year the plumage of the sexes is nearly similar 
and such birds were long considered distinct species, and 
were known as the Dun Diver, Mergus castor. Thus we 
read in 1838 of the Goosander and Dun Diver as among 
the rarer wildfowl to be found in the Lochar Mossf ; and 
in a letter to P. J. Selby, written from Jardine Hall on May 
4th, 1850, Sir William Jardine says: "Yesterday I saw a Dun 
Diver: very late." In the Catalogue of the Birds contained 
in the collection of Sir William Jardine are mentioned three 
Goosanders from the River Annan, and one shot at Jardme 
Hall by the gamekeeper. { A bird of this species is included 
♦ New Slat. Acct. Scot, Vol. IV., pp. 181, 182. 
t Dumfries Courier, February 28th, 1838. 
X Cat. Birds in coll. Sir W. J., p. 179 (7282), a, a, a, b. 
