SPECIES 10. ^NAS SPONSA. 
SUMMER DUCK, OR WOOD DUCK. 
[Plate LXX. — Fig. 3, Male.'\ 
Le Canard d’Etd, Bkiss. vi, p. 351. 11. pi. 52. Jig. 2 . — Le beau 
Canard huppd, Buff, ix, p. 245. — PI. Enl. 980. 981. — Summer 
Duck, Catesby, I, pi. 97. — Edw. pi. 101. — .drct. Zool. JS'’o. 943. 
— Lath. Syn. iii, p. 546. — Peale’s Museum, JVo. 2872, male, 
2873, female.* 
This most beautiful of all our Ducks, has probably no supe- 
rior among its whole tribe for richness and variety of colours. 
It is called the Wood Duck, from the circumstance of its breed- 
ing in hollow trees; and the Summer Duck, from remaining 
with us chiefly during the summer. It is familiarly known in 
every quarter of the United States, from Florida to Lake On- 
tario, in the neighbourhood of which latter place I have myself 
met with it in October. It rarely visits the seashore, or salt 
marshes; its favourite haunts being the solitary deep and muddy 
creeks, ponds, and mill dams of the interior, making its nest 
frequently in old hollow trees that overhang the water. 
The Summer Duck is equally well known in Mexico and 
many of the West India islands. During the whole of our winters 
they are occasionally seen in the states south of the Potowmac. 
On the tenth of January I met with two on a creek near Peters- 
hurgh in Virginia. In the more northern districts, however, 
they are migratory. In Pennsylvania the female usually begins 
to lay late in April or early in May. Instances have been known 
where the nest was constructed of a few sticks laid in a fork of 
the branches; usually, however, the inside of a hollow tree is 
selected for this purpose. On the eighteenth of May I visited 
* .^nas sponsa, Gmel. Syst. i, p. 539, JVo. 43. — Ind. Orn. p. 876, JVo. 97. 
VOL. III. S S 
