WILD DUCKS 173 



were cut open, and the ducklings greedily devoured the eggs 

 and gelatinous matter inside — a cheap food, certainly! He 

 kept the crab always before them, but avoided overfeeding 

 by not replenishing till they had picked off every last vestige 

 of meat, which kept them busy and gave exercise. 



Finding that the young wood ducks and mandarins did 

 not digest crab very well at first, he started these with the 

 firm, grated custard. In a few days he added Spratt's meal, 

 No. 5, which was rather coarse, so he ground it up finer. 

 When they were about ten days old, he began giving them 

 crab, sprinkling the custard and meal on the inside of the 

 crab, and thus he got them eating it. These ducklings seem 

 harder than most to learn to feed, and he found it helped 

 them start to scatter a little grated custard on the grass and 

 weeds, to stick to the stems. They hunt around among the 

 vegetation, and pick up these bits better than from dishes. 

 He has tried these methods for a number of years, and finds 

 them always successful. 



Starting Shy Ducklings. To add to his suggestion about 

 starting ducklings which are reluctant to feed, especially 

 small ducklings captured wild, I had some interesting ex- 

 periences on the western expeditions. The yoimg of the 

 American golden-eye and the white-winged scoter were 

 harder to start than the others. Sometimes also young 

 lesser scaups were a little backward. I foimd it a good plan 

 to put in with them one or two small ducklings of other 

 kinds which were tame and had learned weU how to eat. 

 These were not enough to awe the timid ones or monopolize 

 the food, but usually they soon taught the others proper 

 table manners, which, for a duck, consist in being as greedy 

 as possible. 



Captured Ducklings. Small duckJings captured wild in 

 the marshes were often a difficult problem. When put with 



