228 BULLETIN 126, UNITED STATES NATIONAL, MUSEUM. 



minnows, small frogs, tadpoles, crawfish, snails, insects, aquatic roots, 

 various seeds, and even grains. Audubon (1840) says: 



Whilst in ponds, they feed by diving and dabbling with their bills in the mud 

 amongst the roots of grasses, of which they eat the seeds also, as well as snails and 

 all kinds of aquatic insects. When on rivers, their usual food consists of small fish 

 and crays, the latter of which they procure at the bottom. A male which I shot 

 near Louisville, in the beginning of May, exhibited a protuberance of the neck so 

 very remarkable as to induce me to cut the skin, when I found a frog, the body of 

 which was nearly 2 inches long, and which had almost choked the bird, as it allowed 

 me to go up within a dozen or 15 paces before I took aim. 



Mr. Arthur H. Howell (1911) writes: 



The food of the ringneck consists mainly of the seeds and stems of pond weed, 

 hornwort, and other aquatic plants, with many nymphs and larvae of water insecta. 



Behavior. — Although the ring-necked duck feeds largely in the 

 shallow water of the marshes, it is nevertheless a good diver and can, 

 if necessary, dive in deep water. Its feet are large and powerful, it 

 dives with its wings tightly closed and swims below the surface very 

 rapidly by the use of feet alone. It swims lightly and rapidly on the 

 surface and rises readily from the water, making a whistling sound as 

 it does so. Its flight is swift and vigorous and it is as lively as the 

 other scaup ducks in all its movements. It flies mostly in small flocks 

 of open formation, rather than in close bunches or lines, so that it does 

 not offer such tempting shots as the other bluebills. While on its 

 feeding grounds it is also usually more scattered and more often 

 flushed singly or in pairs. It should be easily recognized in flight by 

 its general resemblance to the scaups and by the absence of the white 

 speculum; the males are conspicuously marked and can be easily 

 recognized by the black back and crested head and by the ringed 

 bill, if near enough; the small white chin does not seem to be very 

 conspicuous in life. Mr. Horace W. Wright (1910) has called atten- 

 tion to another good field mark; he says: 



A conspicuous feature of his plumage as he sits on the water, even at some dis- 

 tance, is a white band on the side of the breast in front of the wing when closed, 

 having the appearance of a bar, but continuous with the white under the wing when 

 the wing is spread. With closed wing as the bird sits ou the water the upper portion 

 of this white bar lies between the black of the breast and the black of the 'nang; 

 the lower portion between the black of the breast and the finely barred side. 



The female is not so easily recognized, as it closely resembles the 

 female redhead, but, if near enough, the white cheeks, faint white 

 eye-ring and ringed bill may be seen. 



Fall. — The fall migrations of these ducks come along slightly in 

 advance of the scaup ducks, southward through the Mississippi valley 

 and southeastward to the South Atlantic States. They frequent the 

 marshes and small ponds on the way and become very abundant in 

 the rice fields and bayous of the Southern States, where they remain 



