110 
BIRDS OF NEW MEXICO 
tail without recurved feathers; head and body brown, variously spotted, streaked, 
and scalloped with darker. Adult female in winter and breeding plumage: Head and 
neck finely streaked with brown, eye streak dusky; underparts dark brownish 
becoming blackish on lower back, body variously mottled, scalloped, and streaked 
with dusky and buff, buff predominating on belly, flanks coarsely mottled; under tail 
coverts and tail brown, tail with pale 
huffy edgings and markings; speculum 
like male, under wing coverts white, 
under tail coverts brown; bill vari¬ 
able, orange or greenish, blotched 
with black; legs and feet pale 
orange-red. Young in juvenal plum¬ 
age: Similar to female but darker 
and more brownish, legs and feet 
duller. 
Comparisons. —The female Mal¬ 
lard may be told from the female 
Pintail by shorter neck and white 
instead of dark mottled wing lin¬ 
ings; from the female Baldpate by 
coarsely mottled instead of plain 
pinkish brown flanks; from the fe¬ 
male Gadwall by two narrow white 
bars bordering the blue speculum instead of one small white patch (Hoffman). 
Range. —Northern Hemisphere. In America breeds from Aleutian and Pribilof 
Islands, northwestern Alaska, northern Mackenzie, northern Manitoba, west coast 
of Hudson Bay south to Virginia, Indiana, Missouri, Kansas, southern New Mexico, 
Arizona (probably), and Lower California; winters from the Aleutians, central 
Alaska, Montana, Nebraska, and Wisconsin east to Maryland and south to Lesser 
Antilles, Panama, and Mexico. 
State Records. —The Mallard is one of the most widely distributed ducks of the 
world, breeding in North America from the Arctic regions south to the central 
United States, and in the Rocky Mountains to southern New Mexico; although, 
while breeding commonly south to Colorado, in New Mexico it finds few places 
suited to its needs. It has been reported breeding at [Coyote Creek (near Black 
Lake), about 7,S00 feet (Piper)]; Halls Peak, 8,000 feet (Barber); Chloride, 
8,500 feet (Blinn); Turrieta Lake (east, slope San Francisco Range near Joseph) 
(Andrus); on the VH-T Ranch (about 80 miles southwest of Magdalena), and at Pasa- 
monte, Union County. At Mayberry Lake (some 60 miles west of Magdalena), 
about 80 birds w r ere noted April 26, 1915; it was found rather common at Lake 
Burford, July 17, 1913, and not through laying, though many miles farther south 
near Beaver Lake (Gila Forest Reserve), 7,500 feet, young were noted June 6, 1913. 
[In the San Simon Marshes, about 4,000 feet, May 9, 1920, one nest with eggs and 
three broods of young were noted. Adults were found May 27-June 22, 1924, on 
lakes east of Dexter and at the White Lakes and others northeast of Roswell, but 
there were no places for them to nest as stock kept the grass eaten down (Ligon).] 
A few are noted irregularly through the summer at Mesilla (Merrill); and they 
probably breed sparingly in the neighboring shallow lakes. [Along the Rio Grande 
within 50 miles of Albuquerque, in 1917 and 1918 they were observed nesting 
(Leopold). At Lake Burford, May-June, 1918, they were among the commonest 
breeding ducks, it being estimated that 40 pairs were preparing to nest (Wetmore). 
Between Belen and Socorro and south to San Marcial, they probably nest in the 
From Handbook of Western Birds (Fuertes) 
Fig. 9. Mallard 
