2.18 
ANAS LABRADORA. 
274 . ANAS LABRADORA , GMELIN AND WILSON. — PIED DUCK. 
WILSON, PLATE LXIX. FIG VI. 
This is rather a scarce species on our coasts, and is 
pever met with on fresh water lakes or rivers. It is 
called by some gunners the sand shoal duck, from its 
habit of frequenting sand bars. Its principal food 
appears to be shell fish, which it procures by diving. 
The flesh is dry, and partakes considerably of the nature 
of its food. It is only seen here during winter ; most 
commonly early in the month of March, a few are 
observed in our market. Of their particular manners, 
place, or mode of breeding, nothing more is known. 
Latham observes, that a pair in the possession of Sir 
Joseph Banks were brought from Labrador. Having 
myself had frequent opportunities of examining both 
sexes of these birds, I find that, like most others, they are 
subject, when young, to a progressive change of colour. 
The full plumaged male is as follows : Length, twenty 
inches; extent, twenty-nine inches; the base of the 
bill, and edges of both mandibles for two-thirds ©f their 
length, are of a pale orange colour ; the rest, black ; 
towards the extremity it widens a little in the manner 
of the shovellers, the sides there having the singularity 
of being only a soft, loose, pendulous skin ; irides, dark 
hazel ; head, and half of the neck, white, marked along 
the crown to the hind head with a stripe of black ; the 
plumage of the cheeks is of a peculiar bristly nature at 
the points, and round the neck passes a collar of black 
which spreads over the back, rump, and tail-coverts ; 
below this colour the upper part of the breast is white, 
extending itself over the whole scapulars, wing-coverts, 
and secondaries ; the primaries, lower part of the breast,: 
w r hole belly, and vent, are black ; tail, pointed, and of 
a blackish hoary colour ; the fore part of the legs 
and ridges of the toes, pale whitish ash ; hind part, 
the same, bespattered with blackish ; webs, black ; the 
edges of both mandibles are largely pectinated. In 
young birds, the whole of the white plumage is generally 
