1 88 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Distinguishing marks. This species differs from all our other river 

 ducks in having a pure white speculum. The female is often confused 

 with the Pintail and Baldpate ducks by ordinary gunners, these species 

 being known as Gray ducks in western New York; but by giving slight 

 attention to the figures on plates 12 and 13 it will be easy to distinguish the 

 difference. 



The Gadwall, or Gray duck, though not common in any part of New 

 York State, is frequently taken on the marshes of Oswego, Cayuga, Seneca, 

 Wayne and Monroe counties, but on Long Island is considered only an 

 accidental visitant. Dutcher records only four specimens from Long 

 Island. Giraud obtained a few along the south shore of Long Island. 

 Mearns found it a transient visitant along the Hudson, Merriam in the 

 Adirondack i-egion, and Ralph and Bagg on Oneida lake. Mr Savage 

 calls it an accidental visitant near Buffalo and Mr Higgins near Cincinnatus. 

 On the Montezuma marshes a very few of these ducks are seen each season, 

 where the drake figured by Mr Fuertes in plate 1 2 was taken on November 

 20th, 1905, by Mr Foster Parker, who states that it is less common than the 

 Shoveler. He once saw a gunner with about 20 which he had killed in 

 "the Ponds." On two occasions I have seen this duck on Canandaigua' 

 lake, btit from my records it is evident that the Shoveler outnumbers 

 the Gadwall about 10 to i. New York records of this sjDecies show that 

 it occurs from March 30th (Cincinnatus) till late in April and from early 

 October until November 24th (Gilgo, L. I.). 



Audubon records on the authority of Dr Boardman that in 18 12 a 

 flock of 30 tame gadwalls was seen in Dutchess county, N. Y., which had 

 been reared by a pair captured in a neighboring mill pond. Wilson obtained 

 the original of his plate 71 near Seneca Falls, N. Y. DeKay stated that 

 this species breeds in the interior of the State, but I have been unable to 

 find any evidence of its nesting nearer than St Clair Flats and Anticosti 

 Island. Like the Mallard the Gadwall is holarctic in distribution, in America 

 breeding from Kansas and Colorado north to Lesser Slave Lake and Ft 

 Churchill. 



