THE MERGANSERS 
279 
Among other ducks this fine bird has the bold, 
confident air of a born free-booter. The back 
of its head is ornamented with several long 
feathers which form a crest, like the war-bonnet 
of a Sioux Indian. The whole head and upper 
neck are black, with green and purple reflec- 
tions. Around the middle of the neck is a con- 
spicuous white collar, and under that is the 
pale rusty-red breast, streaked with black, 
which gives the bird its name. 
nervous, and difficult to keep alive in captivity. 
A fine specimen which we cherished for a time 
in the Flying Cage of the New York Zoological 
Park, along with many other water-birds of 
good size, at first seemed inclined to accept 
the situation, and become acclimatized; but 
it lived only two months. With several Mer- 
gansers together, the result might be more satis- 
factory. 
The Hooded Merganser 1 is distinctly 
steller’s duck. 
Eniconetta stelleri. 
SPECTACLED EIDER. 
Arctonetta fischeri. 
'X 
\ 
KING EIDER. 
Somateria spectabilis. 
RUDDY DUCK. 
Erismatura jamaicensis. 
AMERICAN MERGANSER. 
Merganser americanus. 
HOODED MERGANSER. 
Lophodytes cucullatus. 
This sea-going bird-craft is at home — under 
many names — in both the Old World and the 
New. On our continent it breeds from our 
northern states as far as the Aleutian Islands 
and western Alaska, where the Aleuts prize it 
for food above all other ducks. In winter it 
migrates along our two ocean coasts to southern 
California and Florida. It feeds entirely on 
fish, and the flavor of its flesh is rank and disa- 
greeable. 
Nearly all sportsmen admire this duck, and 
it is much to be regretted that it is so shy and 
marked by a striking, black-and-white semi- 
circular crest of great height, standing stiffly 
erect, and jaunty beyond compare amongst 
water-fowl. By that crest and the slender 
Merganser bill any one may know this bird out 
of ten thousand species, whether seen in New 
York or New Zealand. It ranges all over North 
America, wherever there is water enough 
to float it, down to Mexico and Cuba, and as a 
result has been burdened with an appalling 
1 Lo-phod! y-tes cu-cul-la'tus. Average length, 17 
inches. 
