Identifier: birdsthroughyear00thom (find matches)
Title: Birds through the year
Year: 1922 (1920s)
Authors: Thomas, William Beach, Sir, 1868-1957 Collet, Anthony Keeling, 1877-
Subjects: Birds -- Great Britain Birds -- Pictorial works
Publisher: London, Edinburgh, T.C. and E.C. Jack, ltd
Contributing Library: American Museum of Natural History Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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TUFTED DUCK AND POCHARD pattern, but the black and white patches are replaced by twoshades of brown, so that they are much less conspicuous. All these species belong either to inland waters or tocreeks and harbours; the true sea-ducks haunt open saltwater, and scatter round the coasts in winter with the diversand guillemots and gulls. The commonest of them is thecommon scoter, or black duck, which can often be seennear the coast, as well as occasionally inland, when it hasbeen carried out of its course by stormy weather. Evenduring the hours crossing on the frequented route fromDover to Calais, scoters can often be seen; they fly low overthe water like smaller cormorants, or float low in the troughof the waves. Gannets are also frequently seen in winter inthe straits of Dover, as well as round the rest of our coast;as autumn approaches, they wander from their densely packed * 1
Text Appearing After Image:
WINTER BIRDS OF PASSAGE 289 breeding-places—chiefly off the Scottish coast—and live aroving sea-life till spring. Guillemots, razorbills, and puffinsrove off the coasts through winter in the same way; and thelittle auks join them from their far northern breeding-placeswithin the Arctic circle. True sea-birds, none of themwillingly approach the shore; but we see them cast up deadon the beach after long spells of stormy weather, and theyare sometimes picked up far inland, when gales and thickweather have confused and beaten them from their course.Divers are more often seen close inshore, as well as out atsea; they nest in fresh-water lakes, and sometimes takerefuge on them in winter. The great northern and black-throated species are more often seen in winter than the red-throated, though the last-named is the commonest breedingspecies in Britain, and the great northern diver does notbreed with us at all. Most of the divers seen in winter areimmature birds, and their species is diffi

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