AMERICAN WIDGEON 
197 
and April, mostly from Utah, Oregon and North Carolina, with contributions from 
23 other States, 4 Canadian Provinces, Alaska and Mexico. The vegetable food 
averaged 92.23% of the total, and this in turn consisted of pond-weeds (42.82%), 
grasses (13.9%), algae (7.71 %), sedges (7.41%), wild celery and water-weeds (5.75%), 
water milfoils (3.48%), duck-weeds (2.2%), smart-weeds (1.47%) and various other 
items about (8.5%). By far the most important foods were the true pond-weeds 
(of various species) and widgeon-grass (Ruppia maritima). The few stomachs from 
southwestern Washington contained largely the leaves and root-stalks of eel-grass 
{Zoster a), which is the principal winter food of the European Widgeon. The animal 
food, comprising 6.77 %, is said to be unduly large on account of a group of birds 
from southern Oregon which had fed almost exclusively on snails. Fragments of 
small bivalves were found in 6 stomachs and snails in 29. The percentage of insects 
and crustaceans was negligible (Mabbott, 1920). 
The stomachs of seven birds which I collected on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachu- 
setts, on December 1st, 1919, were examined by Mr. W. F. Kubichek of the U.S. 
Biological Survey. They contained nothing but sago pond-weed {Potamogeton 
pectinatus) and gravel, without any admixture of animal matter. 
The summer food is undoubtedly very different in character, with a much larger 
proportion of animal matter. In Norton Sound, Alaska, they were found feeding 
largely on insects (Adams, in Baird, Brewer and Ridgv'ay, 1884). 
Courtship and Nesting. In Millais’ (1902) opinion the display of the Baldpate is 
“precisely similar’’ to that of its European relative (see Plate 30). It has been de- 
scribed by C. W. Townsend (1916), and Mr. Harper, who has recently been collecting 
for me in the region aboutUake Athabasca, has sent me some interesting field-notes. 
On April 11, 1920, the Saskatchewan River just below Edmonton was still frozen solid, 
except for a few pools of open water. Suddenly three ducks shot down from a great 
height and alighted on one of these pools. They had evidently just arrived from the 
south and were two males and a female. As soon as they had settled, the two former 
began to display. They “milled around, whistling excitedly when when when, and 
cocking up their wings in a remarkably coot-like manner. This tilting of wings 
reached ordinarily an angle of perhaps 45 degrees, but in the moments of greatest 
excitement it went probably to 60 degrees or even 70 degrees. At least once or twice 
the two males went for each other roughly, with bills working and wings heavily flap- 
ping the water. The female, meanwhile, was anything but passive. She, too, cocked 
her wings up to 45 degrees or so, and they were conspicuously crossed in this posi- 
tion. She kept up a purring, growling grrr-grrr, dabbed her head excitedly to one 
side, and nodded it vigorously.” Mr. Harper suggests that the wing-raising may 
have some connection with the exposure of the black crissum and the white patch 
anterior to it. 
