DUCKS 2113 



the wing speculum dark green, and the long tail feathers black, the beak and 

 feet being lead color or brownish. The female is nearly brown throughout, the 

 feathers of the upper parts being mottled with two shades, while those on the 

 under surface are nearly uniform, the tail feathers showing white markings on a 

 brown ground. The length of the male pintail varies from twenty-four to twenty- 

 -eight inches. 



Found throughout the circumpolar regions, the pintail is a migratory species, 

 ranging in winter as far south as Panama and Cuba in the New World, and in the 

 Old World to the Mediterranean, Persia, Ceylon, China, Borneo, and Japan. Its 

 main breeding area in the Old World lies to the north of latitude 60, but it 

 descends below this limit in North Germany and Russia, and still more so in 

 Siberia. A silent bird during the day, the pintail utters a low quacking sound at 

 night. It generally frequents shallow waters, where it feeds upon both vegetable 

 and animal food; and in winter commonly associates in flocks, which in India may 

 include from twenty to two hundred, or occasionally thousands of head, and are 

 at times composed exclusively of male birds. The flight of the pintail is rapid in 

 the extreme, and this, together with its shy and wary habits, renders it one of the 

 most difficult ducks to shoot, although the excellence of its flesh renders it of 

 especial value to the sportsman. When once flushed, pintail almost invariably 

 fly clean away, and cannot be driven backward and forward from one piece of 

 water to another, like so many other ducks. From the closeness of its breast 

 plumage, it is especially necessary in the case of the pintail to allow the bird to 

 pass before firing. In the Southern Hemisphere there are several allied ducks, 

 such as the Chilian pintail (D. spinicauda} of lower South America, the South 

 American Bahama duck (D. bahamensis], and the red-billed duck (Z>. erythro- 

 rhyncha) of South Africa, which are considered by many ornithologists as congeneric 

 with the European species, although by others they are referred to the distinct 

 genus Peerilonetta. They differ from the true pintail in the slight elongation of 

 the middle tail feathers of the male, and the uniformly-dull and much-spotted colora- 

 tion of the two sexes. 



The group of beautiful little ducks known as teal, while presenting a 

 great general resemblance to the pintails, are distinguished, in addition 

 to their small size, by their much shorter necks, and the short and rounded tail of 

 sixteen feathers, the scapulars of the male being also less pointed and elongated. 

 The beak is about equal in length to the head, with its edges nearly parallel, and 

 the lamellae very slightly exposed. In the foot the first toe is very short, and the 

 fourth much shorter than the third. The common teal {Querquedula creccd) is the 

 best-known representative of a group of the genus in which the nape of the neck in 

 the male is ornamented with a small mane-like crest. In length this species meas- 

 ures only fourteen and one-half inches; and in the ordinary plumage the male is 

 characterized by the vermiculated markings of the back, the bright green band, 

 bordered with buff, on the side of the head, the rest of the head chestnut, the wing 

 speculum black, green, and purple, tipped with white, and the breast white, spotted 

 with black. The female has the upper plumage mainlj'- of two shades of brown, 

 and the wing speculum mainly black, with but little green. This species is dis- 

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