Family:
The green-winged teal is the smallest North American dabbling duck with a short, compact body, large head, small bill, and a tail that sits high out of the water. The male in breeding plumage has grey barred plumage with a yellow rump and a narrow white vertical stripe on the shoulder, which distinguishes it from the common teal. The head is cinnamon with a wide green stripe from the top of the eye to the back of the neck. The bill is dark grey and the legs and feet are olive-grey.
The female is brown with a yellow streak along the tail. Both sexes have green wing patches on the secondaries which are usually hidden when not in flight. In non-breeding plumage, the male is similar to the female.
Green-winged teals are noisy ducks – the male has a clear whistle, while the female has a feeble quack.
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Green-winged teals have a varied diet that includes seeds of grass, sedge, and aquatic vegetation, as well as insects, molluscs, and crustaceans.
They feed by tipping up or picking at food in shallow water.
Green-winged teals breeds all across North America from the arctic regions of north Alaska and Canada to central California on lakes, marshes, ponds, and shallow streams with dense, aquatic vegetation. They can be found nesting in mudbanks or stumps, and perching on the low limbs of dead trees.
In winter they migrate south to Central America along the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, flocking to shallow wetlands, coastal marshes, and agricultural areas.
