Lot Essay
According to Gould this species recorded by Colonel Montagu in the Transactions of the Linnean Society, 5th May, 1805, had only once been captured in England, at South Allington, Devon.
The foreground adult is depicted in full summer plumage, two background birds are in summer, and one in winter plumage.
DISTRIBUTION: Breeds southern France, Iberia and northwest Africa and discontinuously eastwards to Japan and Australia, southwards to southern Africa; colonised the Americas earlier this century. Some winter movement of European birds south to northwest Africa. Introduced to Hawaiian islands. Was a rare vagrant to Britain, with only two records accepted as genuine, 1805 and 1917, but from the 1960s has been regularly seen in small numbers
The foreground adult is depicted in full summer plumage, two background birds are in summer, and one in winter plumage.
DISTRIBUTION: Breeds southern France, Iberia and northwest Africa and discontinuously eastwards to Japan and Australia, southwards to southern Africa; colonised the Americas earlier this century. Some winter movement of European birds south to northwest Africa. Introduced to Hawaiian islands. Was a rare vagrant to Britain, with only two records accepted as genuine, 1805 and 1917, but from the 1960s has been regularly seen in small numbers