8 BULLETIN 862, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
MISCELLANEOUS VEGETABLE FOOD, 2.61 PER CENT. 
A large number of miscellaneous items made up the remainder of 
the gadwall’s vegetable food. The stomach of one duck from the 
mouth of Bear River, Utah, was filled with remains of the stems, 
leaves, and seeds of picklegrass (Salicornia ambigua). A young duck 
from the same region had made a meal of willow catkins (Saliz sp.). 
Several gizzards from the wooded swamps of Arkansas contained 
fragments of scales from the cones of bald cypress (Taxodium dis- 
tichum), and one was entirely filled with galls from cypress leaves. 
Many from this region also contained the seeds, or fragments of 
seeds, of grapes (Vitis sp.), hackberry (Celtis sp.), holly (/lex sp.), 
and sumachs (Rhus spp.). Seeds of beggar ticks, or bur marigold 
(Bidens sp.), water milfoil (Myriophyllum sp.), bottle brush (Hip- 
puris vulgaris), crowfoot (Ranunculus sp.), water pennywort (Hydro- 
cotyle sp.), dodder (Cuscuta sp.), myrtle (Myricasp.), bur reed (Sparga- 
nium sp.), helotrope (Heliotropium indicum)}and many others, eaten 
in small quantities, completed the vegetable food of the species. 
Anmrat Foon. 
As has been stated previously, the proportion of animal food 
taken by the gadwall is very small, amounting to only 2.15 per cent 
of the contents of the stomachs examined, exclusive of the few 
scattered items taken during the months from April to August. 
In these the presence of several stomachs of ducklings caused the 
average percentage of animal food to run considerably higher. The 
ficures given were compiled from the contents of the 362 stomachs 
collected during the fall and winter months, from September to 
March. . 
MOLLUSKS (MOLLUSCA), 1.6 PER CENT. 
About three-fourths of the animal food of the gadwall, or 1.6 per 
cent of the total, consisted of mollusks. In 6 April stomachs (not 
included in this average) they amounted to 15.83 per cent of the 
monthly food. In the fall and winter months they ranged from 
nothing in September to 4 per cent in January. Eight species of 
snails were identified, while there were unidentified fragments of 
snails in 5 stomachs and unidentified bivalves in 3. The most 
important snail was Neritina virginea, which is very common on the 
Mississippi Delta and constitutes one of the principal items of food 
of many species of ducks wintering in that region. This had been 
eaten by 25 gadwalls and ranged from a mere trace to 70 per cent of 
the food present. 
INSECTS (INSECTA), 0.39 PER CENT. 
Insects amounted to only 0.39 per cent of the total food. These 
consisted of caddisflies and their larvae (Phryganoidea), 0.19 per cent; 
fles and their larvae (Diptera), 0.07; bugs (Hemiptera), 0.05; 
