WILD FOWL 
and south coasts of Great Britain, especially when the weather on the 
continent is severe, it is more common on the west, and is most numerous 
in the Outer and Inner Hebrides and west coast of Scotland ; likewise in 
the Solway district, Cumberland and Lancashire. To Ireland it is a regular 
winter-visitor, rather abundant in the north and north-west, and in 
Dundalk Bay in the east, but rare in the south. 
RED-BREASTED GOOSE 
BRANTA RUFICOLLIS 
(Plate XXVII, Fig. 9) 
Anser ruficollis, Gould, Birds Europe, v, pi. 351 (1837). 
Bernicla ruficollis. Dresser, Birds Europe, vi, p. 403, pi. 416 (1876); Lilford, Col. Fig. Brit. 
Birds, part xxi, pi. (1892); Saunders, III. Man. Brit. Birds, p. 407 (1899). 
Branta ruficollis, Salvador!, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., xxvii, p. 124 (1895). 
Rufibranta ruficollis, Alph6raky, Geese of Europe, p. 140, pis. xv and xxiv (1905). 
DULT male. — Crown and hind -neck black, that colour extend - 
ing through the eye to the chin and throat, and leaving 
/ a large round white patch between the eye and the base 
of the bill; a large quadrangular patch of chestnut mar- 
g gined with white covers the side of the head and neck, 
Ikh. one angle extending nearly to the eye; fore-neck and chest 
rich chestnut margined all round with a border of black and white, which 
extends across the mantle; back, rump and scapulars black; upper 
tail-coverts white; breast black, the bases of the feathers white; belly 
and under tail -coverts white; sides, flanks and thighs white, barred with 
black at the tips of the feathers; wings black, the greater secondary and 
median wing -coverts tipped with white; axillaries very dark smoky- 
grey. Iris hazel; bill, legs and feet dark brown, almost black. Total length 
about 22 inches; bill 1*0 inch; wing 13 5 inches; tail 4*0 inches; tarsus 
2 *4 inches. 
Adult female . — Similar to the male, but slightly smaller; wing 12*0 
inches. 
General distribution . — The red -breasted goose nests in the tundra of 
Western Siberia from the Obi to the Yenesei, at no great distance from the 
coast, and is not known to occur much to the east of the Taimyr Peninsula. 
321 
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