1 86 The Water-fowl Family 



Habitat — Breeds in the West Indies, and from Guatemala, Texas, 

 and Lower California, north locally to Hudson Bay, Great Slave 

 Lake, and British Columbia ; very rare in the United States in 

 the breeding season east of the Mississippi, except in north- 

 ern Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, but recorded, and in 

 several instances eggs found, in Michigan, Ohio, Maryland, 

 Rhode Island, Massachusetts,Vermont and Maine. Winters from 

 New Jersey, Illinois, Missouri(?), Nevada, and British Columbia, 

 south to West Indies, Columbia, and Lower California. Occurs 

 in migration on the Atlantic Coast north to Newfoundland, and 

 in Bermuda. 



The reputation of the ruddy duck is recent, 

 and dates back to the first scarcity of red-head 

 and canvas-back along our eastern coast. Then a 

 price was put upon its head, and this was followed 

 by a persecution so relentless that shortly one of 

 the commonest, and in many respects most insig- 

 nificant, of our ducks will no longer be known in 

 the old haunts. If it could only acquire the 

 instinct of changing a diet composed of the most 

 delicate grasses and vegetable matter on the duck 

 bill of fare to sea food, it would live to old age 

 unmolested and happy. This bird has nothing to 

 commend it to sportsmen, no use for decoys, keeps 

 off by itself, and, if occasion requires, disappears 

 with the skill of a hell-diver. How unfortunate 

 that a poor duck with such chances for peace- 

 ful existence should be fated ! 



The ruddy duck is exclusively an American 

 bird, occurring throughout the United States and 

 British provinces to Hudson Bay, breeding in 



