Volume 40, Plate VIII / Ornithology (Birds)

Surf Scoter

Œdemia perspicillata

A curiously marked scoter with a tumid bill bearing a raised basal protuberance, whose real home is the coasts of North America where it is abundant in winter southward to Florida. Extremely rare in Britain and Europe, with a few examples near Orkney and Shetland, it breeds in Labrador, the nest of withered weeds lined with down and raised in a tuft of grass, the cream-coloured eggs small for the bird.