FULVOUS WHISTLING-DUCK 

 ( Dendrocygna bicolor ) 



[FR: Dendrocygne a bee f auve , GE: Sichelpf eif gans , SP: Pato silbon, Pichici Col- 

 orado, Pijia, Serrano; US: Fulvous Tree Duck] 



GENERAL DISTRIBUTION 



The Fulvous Whistling-Duck is essentially a bird of pantropical distribu- 

 tion, occurring in a series of disjunct populations in Ceylon and India, Cen- 

 tral Africa and Madagascar, in northern and southern South America, and from 

 the southwestern United States to central Mexico. The latter population breeds 

 from southern California, southwestern Arizona, central Texas and the Gulf 

 coast of Louisiana south through Mexico to Nayarit , the Valley of Mexico, and 

 Veracruz, and locally in southern Florida, Cuba, and Honduras (AOU 1957, Meyer 

 de Schaunesee 1966, Bellrose 1976). The North American population winters in 

 most of its breeding range, but in recent years increasing numbers have spent 

 the winter in the southeastern United States from Virginia to Florida. Esti- 

 mates of late summer numbers of Fulvous Whistling-Ducks in southwestern Louisi- 

 ana and southeastern Texas indicated about 17,000 birds in 1975; some of the 

 recent increase in both breeding and wintering populations in the southeast may 

 be related to changing agricultural methods in that region (Flickinger et al. 

 1977). 



SUSCEPTIBILITY TO OIL POLLUTION 



We have found no references to oiling of Fulvous Whistling-Ducks. As birds 

 of vegetated coastal marshes that are seldom found in open water offshore, they 

 are not likely to be affected except by a massive mishap. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



1980 



Lambeth, D. 0. and G. S. Lambeth. 1980. Second record of Fulvous Whistling 

 Duck for North Dakota. Prairie Nat. 12: 110. 



Rylander, M. K. , E. G. Bolen and R. E. McCamant. 1980. Evidence of incubation 

 patches in Whistling Ducks. Southwest. Nat. 25: 126-128. 



1979 



Langley, C. H. 1979. A further breeding record for the Fulvous Whistling Duck 

 from the Cape Peninsula. Ostrich 50: 62. 



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