Cassell's book of birds; vol. 4

by Alfred Edmund Brehm

EIDER DUCKS AT HOME.

[Pg 162]

The sea, indeed, is the safest place for these helpless nestlings, as there they can most readily escape from their natural enemies the Falcons, Ravens, and Skuas. Very frequently several mothers, accompanied by their little families, consort together, and then they present to the observer a very attractive spectacle. Should the parent birds perceive that they are followed by a boat, they at once begin to paddle away with all their strength, hoping to escape from their pursuers, and it is not till the boat has come close upon them that they decide upon taking wing; by so doing they are of course compelled to desert the young birds, who, however, seem very well to understand how to provide for their own safety, as they immediately make for the land, and scrambling on to the shore, may be seen running nimbly in search of some convenient hiding-place, dropping down between stones, or concealing themselves behind slight inequalities of the ground, from which they are scarcely distinguishable. Should the threatened danger pass away, they will be found after a little time hastening back to the sea, into which they immediately plunge, and paddle away directly from the shore, until they are joined either by their own mother or by some other elderly female belonging to their flock. Should their mother be killed, the young, if unable to do without assistance, at once join some other family, into which they are received without the slightest reluctance, and tended and cared for by the old birds precisely as if they were their own offspring. The instinct for brooding in the Eider Ducks is indeed very remarkable; they will even steal each other's eggs in order to brood upon them. The nestlings grow rapidly, and often within a week from their birth are well able to procure their own food; they remain, nevertheless, in company with their parents till the early part of the following year. In their earliest infancy they are fed with small crustaceans and other soft-bodied animals; at a later period they live for the most part upon bivalve shell-fish, but likewise feed willingly on fishes, or indeed on any small marine animals that they may meet with. Although the Eider Ducks constitute a considerable portion of the wealth of the countries they inhabit, they are by no means cared for and protected as they might be. Intelligent landholders, whose property the breeding-places are, take the opportunity while the birds are laying to remove some of their eggs, and thus succeed in making them lay a greater number than they otherwise would do. Moreover, they are content to wait patiently until the breeding-time is over before they gather the down from[Pg 163] their nests. More generally, however, neither birds nor eggs are taken the least care of. Notwithstanding that their flesh is not by any means palatable, these Ducks are continually persecuted and slaughtered, and the consequence is, that in Spitzbergen and other localities where the sale of the Eider-down used to be reckoned by the hundredweight, it is now reckoned only by pounds. Malmgren assures us that it is a rare thing to see young birds in the autumn; and the bird-catchers are loud in their complaints of a scarcity, for which they have only their own improvidence to blame. In Greenland the diminution, although not quite so conspicuous, is still very great, not more than a thousand pounds being now collected there annually. "Formerly," says Holboell, "the gross quantity of down procured in South Greenland in the course of a year was 5,007 lbs., and North Greenland produced about half that quantity." According to the usual reckoning a dozen nests yield a pound weight of the raw material, so that every year 104,520 birds were not only despoiled of their down but also robbed of their eggs.

THE TRUE EIDER DUCK, OR ST. CUTHBERT'S DUCK.

The TRUE EIDER DUCK, or ST. CUTHBERT'S DUCK (Somateria mollissima), has the cheeks, chin, back, and breast white, the latter with a reddish tinge. Front and sides of the head black; nape, to the throat, pea-green; quills and tail brown, marked on the wings with velvet-black. The eye is reddish brown, the beak greenish yellow, the foot olive-green. The length of this bird is twenty-four inches, the breadth forty; the length of wing eleven inches, and length of tail three inches and a half. The female is smaller than the male, and her plumage rust-red, marked on the head and neck with longitudinal brown streaks, elsewhere with crescent-shaped black spots; her under side with deep brown, slightly lined with black. After the breeding season the plumage of the male loses much of its beautiful glistening appearance, both head and neck become blackish grey, more darkly clouded, the shoulders greyish black, and the region of the crop yellowish white, marked with black and rust-brown upon the borders of the individual feathers. It seems probable that this change of plumage is not produced by moulting, but by a gradual change in the colour of the feathers.

This valuable Duck is met with throughout the northern regions of the globe, its range extending from Jutland to Spitzbergen, and from the west coast of Europe along its northern shores to Greenland and Iceland. It is a constant resident in some of the northern parts of England and Scotland, and has the name of St. Cuthbert's Duck from the numbers that nest in that island. Its most southern breeding-places are upon the Island of Sylt and other small Danish islands in the same latitude, and from thence north it is met with in continually increasing numbers. In Iceland, Greenland, and Norway, it is very abundant, and is preserved with the utmost strictness. Their nests along the coast of Norway, we are told, produce, from the down they yield, on an average, a profit of five pounds a-piece in the year; so that a small barren rock, frequented by these birds, becomes a very valuable property, and has often been the subject of litigation between Norwegian landholders. Some years ago the Eider Fowl were killed in such numbers that their extinction in that country seemed imminent, but in 1847 the Norwegian Parliament passed a law for their relief, and since that time their pursuers have been obliged to confine themselves to robbing the nests; the consequence is that these Ducks are now very plentiful, and from the perfect security in which they live have attained a degree of impudent assurance unsurpassed by the London Sparrows, or their own distant connections on the ornamental waters in our parks. In the town of Tromsöe they come to the house doors to be fed, and walk about as if strongly impressed with the consciousness of their own importance. In the northern parts of Great Britain these birds are seen assembling in groups along the shores of the mainland about April, from whence they cross to the adjacent islands early in May. The nest of this[Pg 164] species, which contains from four to ten (generally six or eight) well-shaped, smooth-shelled eggs, usually of a dusky greyish green, is formed of fine seaweed, and is lined, after the eggs are deposited, with down from the mother's breast, placed so thickly that the eggs are completely hidden from view. The down from a single nest, when cleansed, although sufficient in bulk to fill a man's hat, seldom weighs more than one ounce. In northern countries the business of robbing the nests of this valuable material begins soon after the eggs are laid, the female replacing it by a fresh supply from her breast, until it is quite bare, when the male bird in turn strips himself to provide a warm covering for his young. "In a month's time," says Mr. Selby, "the little family are led or carried in their parent's bill to the water, where they swim and dive with facility; the mother meanwhile carefully watching over them to defend them from their biped foes, and feigning lameness to lure their pursuers from the spot."

THE EIDER DUCK (Somateria mollissima).

"The care which the mother takes of her young," says Audubon, "cannot be exceeded. She leads[Pg 165] them gently in a close flock in shallow waters, where, by diving, they procure food, and at times, when the young are fatigued and at some distance from the shore, she sinks her body in the water and receives them on her back, where they remain several minutes. At the approach of their merciless enemy, the Black-backed Gull, the mother beats the water with her wings, as if intending to raise the spray around her, and, on her uttering a peculiar sound, the young dive in all directions, while she endeavours to entice the marauder to follow her, by feigning lameness, or she leaps out of the water and attacks her enemy, often so vigorously that, exhausted and disappointed, he is glad to fly off, on which she alights near the rocks, among which she expects to find her brood, and calls them to her side. Now and then I saw two females which had formed an attachment for each other, as if for the purpose of more effectually contributing to the safety of their young, and it was very seldom that I saw these prudent mothers assailed by the Gulls."