°1916 J TowNSEND, CouHsMp of Ducks. 13 



Many of them have more or less blood of the Black Duck, but my 

 courtship description applies to what appeared to be full blooded 

 Mallards. 



When the Mallard drake courts, he swims restlessly about 

 following or sidling up to a duck. She may lead him quite a chase 

 before she vouchsafes to acknowledge his presence, although he is 

 continually bowing to her, bobbing his head up and down in nerv- 

 ous jerks so that the yellow bill dips into the water for a quarter 

 of its length and comes up dripping. He also rears himself up in 

 the water and from time to time displays his breast. She occa- 

 sionally turns her head to one side and carelessly dabbles her bill 

 in the water, but sooner or later, if all goes well, she begins to bow 

 also, less vigorously at first — not touching the water at all — and 

 to the empty space in front of her. Suddenly she turns and the 

 pair bow to each other in the same energetic nervous jerks, and, 

 unless a rival appears to spoil the situation, the drake has won his 

 suit. A somewhat similar description of the courtship is given 

 by J. G. Millais,^ but none as far as I know has been given by 

 American writers. 



The most numerous duck in the fresh waters in and about Boston 

 is the Black Duck and both Ajias nihrlpes ruhripcs and Anas 

 rubripes tristis are well represented throughout the winter and 

 spring. A group of fifteen or twenty may be seen solemnly feeding 

 by dipping, with their tails pointing zenithward, when they begin 

 to swim about nervously, weaving their ways in and out among 

 their fellows. Now one swims rapidly with head low and darts 

 at another that, in order to avoid him, dives just below the surface 

 with a great splashing with his wings. Soon nearly the whole 

 group are chasing each other and diving awkwardly. Every now 

 and then the short quack of the drake is heard, sometimes the loud 

 croak of the duck. Now a drake flys for fifteen or twenty feet over 

 the water with drooping body and legs and plumps down by a duck 

 with a splash and an impetus that carries him three or four feet 

 further. This is repeated again and again by the drakes and is a 

 conspicuous part of the courtship. At times they bob the head in a 

 manner exactly similar to that already described in the case of the 



1 The Natural History of the British Surface-feeding Ducks, 1902, p. 6. 



