WOOD DUCK 227 



"Young Wood Ducks when hatched are well equipped for climbing as 

 they are provided with exceedingly sharp, pin-pointed, hooked claws and 

 with hooked nails at the ends of their bills; so expert are they that in 

 many cases when confined in a box or keg, they have been known to 

 climb out, going up the perpendicular sides like flies walking on a wall." 



The manner in which young Wood Ducks reach the ground from 

 their high nests is related in an unpublished MS. by Hawkins and Bellrose 

 as follows: "There has been considerable discussion of the manner in 

 which young Wood Ducks leave the nest. Phillips, who has investigated 

 this subject more thoroughly than anyone else, could find no convincing 

 evidence that adult Wood Ducks every carry their young from the nest to 

 the ground or water. On May 31, 1938, we observed young leave a nest- 

 ing box located 21 feet above the ground and 50 feet from the shore of 

 Lake Chatauqua. At 8.58 a.m. the female appeared at the entrance and, 

 evidently reassured that no danger was near, dropped to the ground and 

 commenced to call. Her note was soft, subdued, and scarcely audible 20 

 feet away. At once a chorus of peeping cries broke out from within the 

 nesting box. Seconds later, a duckling appeared at the entrance, peeped 

 loudly, and, with an upward and outward spring, jumped. In similar 

 fashion 10 other ducklings followed in quick succession. Five minutes 

 after the first had jumped, all were following their mother to the lake. 

 Since that time, we have obtained four additional records of the young 

 leaving the nest by jumping. We do not believe that the fall from the 

 nest is a serious cause of mortality in ducklings. The entrance to another 

 nesting box was about 22 feet above a concrete sidewalk. Witnesses to 

 the exodus of a brood of Wood Ducks hatched in this box in 1939 saw 

 the ducklings bounce as they landed on the sidewalk, but apparently no 

 injuries resulted. If a 6-foot man fell a distance as many times his 

 height, his fall would be over 500 feet." See also the "Life Story" of 

 the American Golden-eye. 



Although the Wood Duck is often seen on open stretches of water 

 or marshy land, its usual feeding grounds are along the banks of wood- 

 land streams and ponds. Here it feeds upon the seeds of various trees 

 and shrubs and wanders deep into the woods in search of nuts, grapes 

 and berries. It is particularly partial to chestnuts, beechnuts, and acorns 

 of the burr and pin oak, which it swallows whole, turning over the leaves 

 to find them, and of which it will often make an entire meal. The tre- 

 mendous crushing and grinding power of the gizzards of ducks breaks 

 the shells of the hardest nuts to pieces, as they enter that organ, after 

 which, chemical disintegration completes the process. Mabbot (1920) 

 says: "The powerful crushing and grinding ability of the Wood Duck's 

 gizzard is shown by the presence in 76 of the stomachs examined of frag- 

 ments of the nuts of the bitter pecan (Hickoria aquatica). These nuts 

 have as hard a shell as any of the northern hickory nuts, yet they are 

 broken as they enter the gizzard and before they can possibly have been 

 exposed to the full crushing power of that organ." See also the "Life 

 Story" of the Mallard. 



