:''For duck as a food, see
Duck (food); for other meanings, see
Duck (disambiguation)''.
{{Taxobox
| color = pink
| name = Ducks
| image = Ducks in plymouth, massachusetts.jpg
| image_width = 250px
| image_caption = A duck (female) and drake (male)
Mallard
| regnum =
Animalia
| phylum =
Chordata
| classis =
Aves
| ordo =
Anseriformes
| familia =
Anatidae
| subdivision_ranks = Subfamilies
| subdivision =
Dendrocygninae
Oxyurinae
Anatinae
Aythyinae
Merginae
}}
Duck is the common name for a number of species in the
Anatidae family of
birds. The ducks are divided between several subfamilies listed in full in the
Anatidae article. Ducks are mostly aquatic birds, mostly smaller than their relatives the
swans and
geese, and may be found in both
fresh water and
sea water.
Most ducks have a wide flat
beak adapted for
dredging. They exploit a variety of food sources such as
grasses,
aquatic plants,
fish,
insects, small
amphibians
http://icons.wunderground.com/data/wximagenew/t/tomekandjola/1754.jpg,
worms, and small
molluscs.
Ducks are sometimes confused with several types of unrelated
water birds with similar forms, such as
loons or divers,
grebes,
gallinules, and
coots.
Many species of duck are temporarily flightless while
moulting; they seek out protected habitat with good food supplies during this period. This moult typically precedes
migration.
Some duck species, mainly those breeding in the temperate and Arctic
Northern Hemisphere, are migratory; those in the tropics, however, are generally not. Some ducks, particularly in
Australia where rainfall is patchy and erratic, are nomadic, seeking out the temporary lakes and pools that form after localised heavy rain.
Types of ducks, and feeding
Diving ducks and
sea ducks forage deep underwater. To be able to submerge more easily, the diving ducks are heavier than dabbling ducks, and therefore have more difficulty taking off to fly.
Dabbling ducks feed on the surface of water or on land, or as deep as they can reach by up-ending without completely submerging.
{{cite web
| last = Ogden
| first = Evans
| title = Dabbling Ducks
| publisher = CWE
| url = http://www.sfu.ca/biology/wildberg/species/dabbducks.html
| accessdate = 2006-11-02 }}
They have along the inside of the beak tiny rows of plates called
lamellae like a whale's
baleen. These let them filter water out of the side of their beaks and keep food inside.
A few specialized species such as the
smew,
goosander, and the
mergansers are adapted to catch large fish.
In the
Mallard the tongue is a flat plate, and on the tongue's back end is a short liftable flap with about 18 short spikes on for pushing struggling prey and other food down its throat.
Breeding
The males (drakes) of northern species often have extravagant
plumage, but that is
moulted in summer to give a more female-like appearance, the "eclipse" plumage. Southern resident species typically show less
sexual dimorphism.
Some people use "duck" specifically for adult females and "drake" for adult males, for the species described here; others use "hen" and "drake", respectively.
Predators
A worldwide group like the ducks has many predators. Ducklings are particularly vulnerable, since their inability to fly makes them easy prey not only for avian hunters but also large fish like
pike,
crocodilians, and other aquatic hunters, including fish-eating birds such as
herons. Nests may also be raided by land-based predators, and brooding females may sometimes be caught unaware on the nest by
mammals (e.g.
foxes) and large birds, including
hawks and
eagles.
Adult ducks are fast fliers, but may be caught on the water by large aquatic predators. This can occasionally include fish such as the
muskie in North America or the
pike in
Europe. In flight, ducks are safe from all but a few
predators such as
humans and the
Peregrine Falcon, which regularly uses its speed and strength to catch ducks.
Etymology
The word
duck (from
Anglo-Saxon ''dūce''), meaning the bird, came from the verb "to duck" (from Anglo-Saxon supposed
''dūcan'') meaning "to bend down low as if to get under something" or "to dive", because of the way many species in the dabbling duck group feed by upending (compare Dutch ''duiken'', German ''tauchen'' = "to dive").
This happened because the older
Anglo-Saxon words ''ened'' (= "duck") and ''ende'' (= "end") came to be pronounced the same: other Germanic languages still have similar words for "duck" and "end": for example, Dutch ''eend'' = "duck", ''eind'' = "end", German ''ente'' = "duck", ''ende'' = "end"; this similarity goes back to
Indo-European: compare
Latin ''anas'' (
stem ''anat-'') = "duck",
Lithuanian ''antis'' = "duck",
Ancient Greek νησσα, νηττα (''nēssa'', ''nētta'') = "duck";
Sanskrit ''anta'' = "end".
Hunting, domestication, and urbanization
In many areas, wild ducks of various species (including ducks farmed and released into the wild) are hunted for food or sport, by
shooting, or formerly by
decoys. From this came the expression "a sitting duck", which means "an easy target".
Ducks have many economic uses, being
farmed for their
meat,
eggs,
feathers, (particularly their
down). They are also kept and bred by aviculturists and often displayed in zoos. All
domestic ducks are descended from the wild
Mallard ''Anas platyrhynchos'', except the
Muscovy Duck
{{cite web
| last =
| title = Mallard - Nature Notes
| publisher = Ducks Unlimited Canada
| url = http://www.ducks.ca/resource/general/naturenotes/mallard.html
| accessdate = 2006-11-02 }}
. Many domestic breeds have become much larger than their wild ancestor, with a "hull length" (from base of neck to base of tail) of 30 cm (12 inches) or more and routinely able to swallow an adult
British Common Frog ''Rana temporaria'' whole.
Foie gras is often made using the
liver of domestic ducks, rather than of
geese.
In a wildlife pond, the bottom over most of the area should be too deep for dabbling wild ducks to reach the bottom, to protect bottom-living life from being constantly disturbed and eaten by wild ducks dredging, and
domestic ducks should not be allowed in.Despite widespread misconceptions, most ducks other than female
Mallards and
domestic ducks do not "quack"; for example, the
scaup makes a noise like "scaup", whence its name.
A common
urban legend says that quacks do not echo
{{cite web
| last = Amos
| first = Jonathan
| title = Sound science is quackers
| publisher = BBC News
| url = http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3086890.stm
| accessdate = 2006-11-02 }}
, however this has been
shown to be false.
Ducks have become an accepted presence in populated areas. Migration patterns have changed such that many species remain in an area during the winter months. In spring and early summer ducks sometimes influence human activity through their nesting; sometimes a duck pair nests well away from water, needing a long trek to water for the hatchlings: this sometimes causes an urgent
wildlife rescue operation (e.g. by the
RSPCA) if the duck nested somewhere unsuitable like in a small enclosed
courtyard.
FAO reports that
China is the top duck market in 2004 followed by
Vietnam and other
South East Asian countries.
Quacks like a duck
The expression "quacks like a duck" is sometimes a short form for "It looks like a duck, it quacks like a duck, it swims like a duck, so it's a duck.", used as
proverbial to counter abstruse arguments that something is not what it appears to be.
The expression is part of a conceptual framework for testing (see
Duck test) of some computer systems. In a sense, this usage results from a need for 'behavioral' analysis of an entity (virtual or otherwise) in an attempt to know what it is or whether it is what is 'claimed' of it (by itself or another). One can even argue several philosophical points (see
Operational definition). But, it's really in 'computing' where entities emerge (evolve) that are not 'covered' by
theory or some known 'meta' view where this idea has taken hold, especially in forms related to
advanced techniques. (As aforementioned though, very few ducks actually do "quack")
Gallery
Image:Duck_wings_outstretched.jpg|A Muscovy Duck stretching its wings in a freshwater spring
Image:Duck head.JPG|A Domesticated duck
Image:Brown Ducks.JPG|Some domesticated ducks
Image:Mallard_with_duckling.jpg|A Female Mallard with a duckling Mallard
Image:Comb duck.jpg|African Comb Duck
Image:duck-on-ground.jpg|Mallard drake
Image:ruddy.shelduck.arp.2.750pix.jpg|Ruddy Shelduck - not a true duck but a member of the Tadorninae
Image:Wood_duck_eclipse.jpg|Male Wood Duck in eclipse plumage
Image:Female Mallard.jpg|Female Mallard
Image:Mother duck with chicks.jpg|Female Mallard with ducklings
Image:Muscovy-duck-1.jpg|Male Muscovy Duck
Image:Mandarin.duck.arp.jpg|Mandarin Duck at Slimbridge Wildfowl and Wetlands Centre, Gloucestershire, England.
Image:Keralabackducks (75).JPG|Ducks in a pond
Image:Aa_ducks_and_geese_003.jpg|Ducks and geese in a yard in Manchester, UK
Image:Indian Runner Duck.jpg|Indian Runner Duck
Image:Ringed teal.gif|Ringed Teal
Image:Red-crested.pochard.slimbridge.arp.jpg |Red-crested Pochard
Image:Male_muscovy_duck_on_grass.jpg| Male Muscovy Duck
Image:Duck 3a.jpg
References
