DUCKS 



2111 



water, although at times some distance from the latter. The nest is lined with dry 

 grass, leaves, or down, the smooth eggs being of a dull greenish-gray color. The 

 gadwall, however, lays creamy-yellow eggs, varying in number from nine to thir- 

 teen. Instances are on record of wild ducks nesting in trees at considerable heights 

 above the ground, from whence the young were doubtless carried down in the same 

 manner as those of the tree ducks. Essentially a winter migrant when breeding in 

 high northern latitudes, the mallard appears at that season in immense numbers in 

 certain districts of the British Islands as well as in the plains of India. These birds 

 are, however, rarely seen in large flocks, usually associating in parties of from three 

 to ten, and later on in pairs. In common with other water fowl, hosts of these 

 ducks are taken in decoys or shot from punts with swivel guns. 



The Shoveller 

 Ducks 



COMMON SHOVEIXER DUCK. 



The enormous size and ungainly form of their flat beaks serves at 

 once to differentiate the large ducks known as shovellers from all their 

 allies. In these birds the beak is considerably longer than the head, 

 compressed at the base, and very broad at the tip, where the upper mandible over- 

 hangs the lower, behind which the lamellae are distinctly exposed. The wings are 

 pointed, with the first and second quills the longest; the short and graduated tail 

 includes fourteen feathers. The legs are very short. As being the best-known 

 representative of the genus, our illustration depicts the common shoveller (Spatula 



