96 GAME BIRDS, WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



Range. — Western hemisphere. Breeds from central British Cohuiihia. 

 Great Slave Lake, central Ungava and Newfoundland south to central 

 Oregon, northern Nevada, northern New Mexico, central Missouri, 

 southern Indiana, northern Ohio, western New York (occasionally 

 Rhode Island) and Maine; winters from southern British Columbia, 

 Arizona, southern Illinois, Maryland and Delaware south to the West 

 Indies and South America as far as Brazil and Chile; accidental in 

 Bermuda and Europe. 



History. 



This Teal was formerly one of the most numerous Ducks 

 of New England and nested here. Mr. Louis Agassiz Fuertes 

 says that it formerly bred abundantly at Cayuga, N. Y. Mr. 

 Lawrence Horton of Canton, Mass., says that he believes it 

 used to breed in the Neponset meadows as late as about the 

 year 1888. It still breeds in the marshes of Seneca, Cayuga, 

 Wayne and Oswego counties, New York, and in many other 

 localities (Eaton). It is now becoming rare, and does not 

 breed at all in the New England States, so far as I am aware, 

 except in small numbers in Vermont and Maine. The species 

 is recorded as nesting formerly in Rhode Island, and even as 

 far south as North Carolina and Cuba. 



The following abridged extracts from the writings of well- 

 known ornithologists indicate its former abundance and recent 

 diminution: Appears with us in September, when it is abun- 

 dant on the Hudson, and soon leaves for the south (De Kay, 

 New York, 1844). Common spring and autumn migrant 

 (Maynard, eastern Massachusetts, 1870). Rather common 

 spring and autumn migrant; formerly doubtless summer resi- 

 dent (J. A. Allen, Massachusetts, 1879). Uncommon in New 

 England (Chamberlain, 1891). Have killed good bags of 

 these birds on the fowl meadows lying between Canton and 

 Dedham; it is also pretty abundant in the ponds and streams 

 of Plymouth county (Samuels, 1897). Has become scarcer 

 of late years; can hardly be called common except in wilder 

 portions of Maine (Hoffman, New England and New York, 

 1904). Formerly one of the most abundant of the water 

 birds that visited the region about Cambridge in autumn; 

 now comparatively seldom met with (Brewster, 1906). Mr. 

 Robert O. Morris of Springfield states that formerly large 

 flocks appeared at Springfield. Mr. Lewis W. Hill states 



