28 



BULLETIN 465, U. S. DEPARTMENT OP AGRICULTURE. 



CHUFA. 



VALUE AS DUCK FOOD. 



Like some of the other duck foods mentioned in this bulletin, 

 chufas {Cyperus esculentus) are at present known to be of only local 

 importance. Those best acquainted with, conditions at Big Lake, 

 Ark., formerly one of the most famous hunting grounds of the South, 

 now a national bird-reservation, believe that the chufa, or nut grass 

 as it is there called, is the principal element in rendering that lake so 

 attractive to waterfowl. Examination of stomachs from that locality 

 seems to justify this belief. Six of a series of nine mallards collected 

 at Big Lake in December, 1910, had fed on sedge tubers, the average 





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Fig. 26. — Range of the wapato. «. 



percentage of which in the food of the nine was 56. Tubers of this 

 species, or others of its genus, have been found also in duck stomachs 

 from Florida, Illinois, Minnesota, and California. The species of 

 ducks now known to feed on chufas are the wood duck, mottled duck, 

 mallard, and canvas-back. 



DESCRIPTION OF PLANT. 



The chufa (fig. 27) belongs to the group of plants known as 

 sedges. These are grasslike and are usually classed with grasses by 

 nonbotanists. Many of the sedges, however, including the chufa, 

 have triangular, not round, stalks. The members of the genus 

 Cyperus have a group of leaves at the base from which rises the 

 stalk bearing the flowers and seeds. In the chufa these stalks are 



