LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN AVILD FOWL. 141 



exactly like a cat "gettin£? up steam " for the final rush on a \T.ctim. .Sometimea he 

 seemed to get into a frantic state of excitement, darting liere and there as if he saw- 

 beetles rising in every direction. I noticed also that while devouring his prey the 

 pupils of his eyes were unusually contracted, and the golden circlets seemed to shine 

 more brilliantly than usual. 



The food of the shoveller consists of grasses, the buds and young 

 shoots of rushes, and other water plants, small fishes, small frogs, 

 tadpoles, shrimps, leeches, aquatic worms, crustaceans, small mol- 

 lusks, particularly snails, water insects, and other insects, as well as 

 their larvae and pupae. 



Doctor Yorke (1899) adds the following to the list: "Teal moss 

 (Limnohium) , various water lilies, flags, duck-weeds, and pondweeds." 



The shoveller is an exceedingly active flyer; it rises quickly from the 

 water, mounting straight up into the air, and darting off with a sv/ift 

 though somewhat erratic flight. Its flight is somewhat like that of 

 the teals and, like them, it frequently makes sudden downward 

 plunges. It is not shy and shows a tendency to return to the spot 

 where it was flushed. On migrations it flies in small flocks by itself, 

 though in the fall it is often associated with the gadwall, baldpate, 

 or lesser scaup duck. During the mating season it is usually seen 

 flying in pairs, with the male leading, or in trios, with a female lead- 

 ing two males. The shoveller is easily recognized in flight; the strik- 

 ing colors of the drake can not be mistaken; and the females and 

 young can easily be identified by the long slender necks and con- 

 spicuously large bills ; I have seldom been in doubt when flushing 

 a female shoveller from her nest. 



The shoveller has a small throat and a weak voice. It is usually 

 silent, but the female sometimes indulges in a few feeble quacks and 

 the male makes a low guttural sound like the syllables woh, woh, 

 woh, or toolc, took, took; this sound has been likened by some writers 

 to the sound made by turning a watchman's rattle very slowly. 



Mr. Robert B. Rockwell writes me: 



From a good many years of observation as a duck hunter I am of the opinion that 

 the shoveller is one of the most sociable species of wild duck. Single shovellers are 

 very frequently seen in flocks of other species, especially teal, and the ease with 

 which individuals and even good-sized flocks of these birds are decoyed is in itself 

 good evidence that they are of a sociable disposition. 



Throughout our Barr work the drake shovellers during the nesting season were 

 seen in considerable numbers but were seldom seen swimming about alone, nearly 

 always being in company with other species of ducks; nor did they seem to prefer 

 the company of males of their own species particularly. 



Fall. — The shoveller is one of the earliest migrants in the fall; the 

 first autumnal frosts, late in August or early in September, are enough 

 to start it drifting along with the blue-winged teal; the migration is 

 well under way by the middle of September, and a month later it is 

 practically over. 



