EUROPEAN TEAL 
225 
ture reproduction of that of the Mallard. The dilatation is .left-sided and about the 
size of a large pea. 
Food. The diet of Teal consists more of the seeds of pond-weeds and sedges 
than of their leaves or stalks. They are chiefly vegetarian, but at times take a con- 
siderable amount of animal food : snails, worms, slugs and insect larvse. Of the seeds 
of various aquatic plants which have been found by Naumann (1896-1905), W. 
Thompson (1851), Cordeaux (1896), Kelso (1913), the following may be mentioned: 
Panicum glaucum and viride (meadow-grasses) ; Potamogeton marinus and pectinatus 
(pond-weeds) ; Glyceria fluitans (manna-grass) ; Carex muricata (sedge) ; Polygonum 
sapathifolium, persicaria and hydropiper (smart-weeds); Scirpus lacustris, palustris 
and maritimus (rushes) ; Zostera marina (eel-grass). When food is plentiful in autumn 
and winter they rarely visit the grain-fields, but in spring they are found more com- 
monly than any duck except the Mallard, feeding on old grain in the stubble fields 
(Dresser, 1871-81; Naumann, 1896-1905). In India they feed to some extent on 
the wild rice (Hume and Marshall, 1879). 
Courtship and Nesting. The display of the Teal is a most beautiful perfor- 
mance, very suggestive of that of the Mallard, but not quite so elaborate. It was 
first described by MiUais (1902), then by Rogeron (1903), Heinroth (1911) and 
Wormald (1914). Several males are commonly seen in action at the same moment. 
The tail is erected, the neck arched, and the body raised almost perpendicularly in 
the water, all at the same instant. Then the bill is dipped to the surface of the water 
and passed rapidly up the breast. This whole exhibition, which takes so long to 
describe, is in reality made with such surprising speed that it is by no means easy to 
obtain a clear impression of it. The low, clear, double whistle of the male is uttered 
the moment the bill is passed down the chest. Wormald’s “position number 5 ” (in 
which the Mallard stretches the head out flat on the water) is not seen in the Teal 
except after the mating act. Pursuit flights, after the breeding grounds are reached, 
undoubtedly take place as in our American Teal. This was first suggested by 
Naumann many years ago but apparently has never been fully described for this 
species. 
The time of nesting is of course very irregular, depending on latitude, altitude and 
the conditions of the particular season, so that a series of dates can mean very little. 
Teal nest somewhat later than Mallard, but rather earlier than Gadwall or Widgeon. 
In the British Isles, May is the usual month, but a few nest as early as late April 
or as late as early June. In Iceland the breeding period usually falls in late May 
and early Jime (Hantzsch, 1905), and in northern Europe it extends into middle 
or late June. In northwestern Finland clutches are complete about mid-June 
(Montell, 1917), and there are late dates for July. On the middle Ob, young in down 
