THE GUN AT HOME AND ABROAD 
HOODED MERGANSER 
LOPHODYTES CUCULLATUS 
(Plate XXX, Figs. 8 and 8a) 
Mergus cucullatus, Gould, Birds Europe, v, pi. 386 (1837) ; Lilford, Col. Fig. Brit. Birds, 
part xxxi, pi. (1895) ; Saunders, III. Mqh. Brit. Birds, p. 477 (1899). 
Lophodytes cucullatus, Salvador!, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., xxvii, p. 468 (1895). 
DULT male. — Head and neck black, becoming sooty -black on 
the forepart of the crown; the feathers of the hinder 
g part of the crown and occiput much lengthened, and 
forming a full compressed semicircular crest, the 
g posterior half of which is white edged with black; back, 
^ j^rump and upper tail-coverts brownish -black; scapulars 
deep black; base of the fore -neck, breast and belly white; on the sides 
of the breast two pairs of crescentic black bands descend from the mantle, 
the upper pair being indistinctly united across the chest; sides and flanks 
greyish -rufous narrowly barred with wavy blackish cross -lines; under 
tail-coverts brownish-grey mottled with light sandy -white; lesser wing- 
coverts blackish, median grey; long curved outer secondary quills black 
with a wide white shaft -stripe; rest of the secondaries brownish -black, 
the median ones with the terminal half of the outer web widely edged 
with white; greater secondary coverts black tipped with white, the black 
bases of the secondary quills and their coverts forming a double black 
band across a white ground; outer webs and tips of the primary quills 
brownish -black, the rest of the inner webs greyish -brown; axillaries 
white. Iris bright yellow; bill black; legs and toes yellowish -brown. 
Total length about 19 inches; bill 1*6 inch; wing 7' 8 inches; tail 3 6 
inches; tarsus 1 3 inch. 
Adult male in eclipse -plumage . — Similar to the adult female, but with the 
throat and middle of the fore -neck blackish. 
Adult female. — ^Head, neck and upper part of the chest greyish -brown; 
the feathers of the occiput brownish -rufous and much lengthened, forming 
an erect compressed crest; chin and throat white; upperparts as well 
as the sides and flanks, dark brown with paler margins to the feathers; 
rest of the underparts white ; under tail -coverts spotted and mottled with 
dark brown; the wings differ from those of the male in having all the 
wing-coverts dark brown and the inner secondaries much less lengthened 
382 
