The Redhead 



Authorities. — Woodhouse ( Nyroca ferina), Rep. Sitgreaves Exped. Col. R.. 

 1853, p. 104 (Calif.); Willett, Pac. Coast Avifauna, no. 7, 1912, p. 24 (s. Calif.; nesting 

 dates); H. C.Bryant, Condor, vol. xvi., 1914, pp. 228, 229, 231 (desc. nest and eggs, etc.). 



THE MEMBERS of the genus Marila may be characterized as over- 

 trustful fowl ; for of these the Canvasback alone has acquired wisdom (and 

 he at bitter cost), while the Redhead has very nearly achieved extinction. 

 From what we know of physical conditions, and from what we gather of 

 earlier accounts, we conclude that the Redhead was once fairly abundant 

 as a breeding bird of California. Although it is still faithful to its old 

 breeding haunts, the discovery of a nest is rated as an achievement. The 

 bird's confiding disposition, meriting at times the name "fool duck," to- 

 gether with the undoubted savor of its flesh, has invited an incessant per- 

 secution, which must have resulted by now in a ninety or ninety-five per 

 cent reduction in numbers. Add to these factors the close resemblance 

 which the Redhead bears to the distinguished, if over-rated, Canvas- 

 back, and the only wonder is that any survive. 



Redheads arrive from the North in mid-autumn, and those which 

 attempt to winter in the Sacramento Valley, or about San Francisco Bay, 

 hail, presumably, from the "Upper Sonoran" interior of Oregon, Washing- 

 ton, and British Columbia. The California breeders at the same time 

 probably retreat to Lower California and Mexico. At any rate, the species 

 is nearly unrepresented in winter on the interior lakes of southern Cali- 

 fornia; and those which formerly wintered in the coastal lagoons of Los 

 Angeles County may have been, like those of the Sacramento and Tulare 

 country, Canadian-bred birds. 



Ecologically speaking, the Redhead forms a sort of connecting link 

 between "River" and "Sea" Ducks. In nesting it does not deploy over 

 the landscape, after the democratic fashion of Pintails and Mallards, but 

 it keeps to deep water, or at least to such reaches of cat-tails and sedges 

 as are well watered at the base. Like the Ruddy, it is a bird of the channels 

 and the deeper shallows, instead of the mud-flats and meadows. On the 

 other hand, it does not, like Scaups or even Canvasbacks, resort to the 

 kelp-beds or the open ocean in winter; but it keeps rather to the larger 

 bodies of fresh water or, at most, frequents only the brackish lagoons of 

 coastal districts. 



Most of the Redhead's food is obtained by diving; and it consists 

 not alone of minnows, frogs, newts, and the smaller mollusks, but more 

 largely of the leaves or roots of various aquatic plants. It is generally 

 a "clean feeder"; and when it is able to add wild celery to its bill of fare, 

 its flesh is rated very high upon the market. 



The Redhead's affinity for deep water is best illustrated by its nest- 



1801 



