SPECIES 19. ^N^S FERINA? 
RED-HEADED DUCK. 
[Plate LXX. — Fig. 6, Male.'] 
Peale’s Museum, JSTo. 2710.* 
This is a common associate of the Canvas-back, frequenting 
the same places, and feeding on the stems of the same grass, 
the latter eating only the roots; its flesh is very little inferior, 
and it is often sold in our markets for the Canvas-back, to those 
unacquainted with the characteristic marks of each. Anxious 
as I am to determine precisely whether this species be the Red- 
headed Wigeon, Pochard, or Dun j bird of England, I have not 
been able to ascertain the point to my own satisfaction; though 
I think it very probably the same, the size, extent, and gene- 
ral description of the Pochard agreeing pretty nearly with this. 
The Red-head is twenty inches in length, and two feet six 
inches in extent; bill dark slate, sometimes black, two inches 
long, and seven-eights of an inch thick at the base, furnished 
with a large broad nail at the extremity; irides flame-coloured; 
plumage of the head long, velvetty, and inflated, running high 
above the base of the bill; head, and about two inches of the 
neck deep glossy reddish chestnut; rest of the neck and upper 
* Anas Ferina, Gmei. i, p. 530, No. 31. — Anas rufa, Id. p. 515. — Ind. Orn. 
p. 862, No. 77; p. 863, No. 78. — Rufotts necked-Duck, Gen. Syn. iii, p. 477, 
No. 32. — Pochard, Id. -p. 523, No. 68. — Red-headed Duck, Lawson’s Carolina, 
p. 150. — Bewick, ii, p. 320 — Arct. Zool. No. 491. Br. Zool. No. 284 — Le 
Millouin, Baiss. vi, p. 384, Ao. 19, pi. 35. fig. 1; Le Millouin mis. Id. p. 389, 
A. young male?; Le Millouin du Mexique, Id. p. 390, No. 20, female. Buff. 
IX, p. 216. PI. Enl. 803. Temm. Man. d'Orn. p. 669. — Wieioughbt, p. 367, 
§ XI. — Montagu, Orn. Did . — Peaee’s Museum, No. 2711, female. 
t Local names given to one and the same Duck. It is also called the 
Poker. 
