198 GAME SHOAL-WATER FOWL. 



Beech-mast, a favorite food of sprigtails, is often 

 very abundant, but the trees are as often on the 

 hills far from water as near by, and no duck 

 often makes a business of looking for food many 

 miles from water, unless it be to sometimes steal 

 a little corn or other grain from the farmers. 

 The food of the black ducks, which are often 

 found there in quite goodly numbers, consists 

 mainly of leeches, snails, insects, and larvae ; and 

 though sprigtails and mallards often partake of 

 them, I am inclined to believe they would pre- 

 fer wild oats as a steady diet. 



Sprigtails are not usually so plenty in the 

 Western States in the fall as during the spring ; 

 but a few make their appearance during Septem- 

 ber, associating very generally with the other 

 shoal-water ducks, but with the mallard most par- 

 ticularly ; feeding and travelling with the same 

 flock continually for days, and timing their flights, 

 which are usually much faster than that of the 

 mallard, to its rate of speed. "Upon the break- 

 ing up of winter, however, they begin to arrive 

 in countless numbers, taking possession, as it were, 

 of the overflowed prairies and corn-fields, where 

 they feed upon the previous season's waste and 

 unharvested grain, and the grass-seeds which, float- 



