160 BULLETIN 130, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Game. — Ruddy ducks resort in large numbers, late in the fall, to 

 Back Bay, Virginia, where they are known as "boobies," and fur- 

 nish good sport for the numerous duck clubs located in that famous 

 lesort for sportsmen. Here they spend the winter in the broad 

 exj)anse of shallow fresh and brackish water bays and estuaries, 

 with the hosts of other wild fowl that frequent that favored region, 

 growing fat and tender on the abundance of foxtail grass, w41d 

 celery, and other duck foods. Their feeding grounds are mainly in 

 the shallower, more protected parts of the bays and near the shores, 

 where they are most intimately associated with the American coots 

 which gather there in immense rafts. Large flocks of these sprightly 

 little ducks are frequently seen flying back and forth and they are 

 popular with the sportsman, as they are lively on the wing, decoy 

 readily under proper conditions, and are excellent table birds when 

 fattened on clean vegetable food. They are usually shot from the 

 batteries, such as are used for canvasbacks, but, as they are a little 

 shy about coming to the large rafts of canvasback decoys that are 

 used for the larger duckSy better results are obtained by " tying 

 out " the battery with a smaller number of " booby " decoys. Under 

 favorable circumstances it does not take long for a gunner to secure 

 his legal limit of 35 ducks a day. Another method of shooting them, 

 which is often very succesful, is for a number of boats to surround 

 a flock of birds or drive them into some small bay, where they are 

 eventually forced to fly out past the boats, as they do not like to fly 

 over the land. 



DISTRIBUTION 



Breeding range. — Mainly in the sloughs and marshes of central 

 and western North America. East to southern Manitoba (Shoal 

 Lake), west central Minnesota (Becker County), southeastern Wis- 

 consin (Lakes Koshkonong and Pewaukee), and southeastern Michi- 

 gan (St. Clair Flats). South to northern Illinois (Lake and Put- 

 nam Counties), northern Iowa (Hancock County), south central 

 Texas (Bexar County), northern New Mexico (Lake Burford), 

 central Arizona (Mogollon Mountains), and northern Lovv^er Cali- 

 fornia (latitude 31° N.). West to southern and central California 

 (San Diego, Los Angeles, Monterey, and Siskiyou Counties), central 

 Oregon (Klamath and Malheur Lakes), northwestern Washington 

 (Seattle and Tacoma), and central British Columbia (Cariboo Dis- 

 trict). North throughout much of Alberta (Buffalo Lake and Bel- 

 vedere), probably to Great Slave Lake (Fort Resolution) and to 

 northern Manitoba (York factory). 



Outlying, and probably casual, breeding stations have been re- 

 corded as far east as Ungava (Richmond Gulf), southeastern Maine 



