Webbed Bandits

      Many times I have seen these plump, little ducks in action as feathered bandits on ponds and marshes in the Middle Atlantic States in winter and early spring.  They are a species of puddle ducks called American wigeons.
     American wigeons form large flocks in winter, including here in the Middle Atlantic States, when they get food in several ways which lends to their success as a species.  They tip-up in shallow water to shovel up aquatic vegetation as all dabbler ducks, their relatives, do.  But they also feed on short grass on lawns and the green shoots of winter rye in fields with flocks of Canada geese.  And they eat waste grain on the ground in harvested fields with the Canadas and dabbling ducks.   
     But that's not all wigeons' congregations consume through winter.  These cute, little ducks are also robber ducks.  They join gatherings of American coots and certain species of diving ducks, all of which ingest water plants.  The coots, ring-necked ducks, lesser scaup ducks and other kinds of ducks on inland ponds and marsh shallows dive under water and swim to the bottom to pull up aquatic vegetation.  They bring those plants to the surface to swallow them, but wigeon individuals zip through the water's surface to those diving birds and grab some of those plants before the divers can swallow them.  The divers don't seem perturbed by the robbery, and only keep diving to the bottom to get aquatic vegetation to eat until they are filled and rest on the water's surface.
     American wigeons are only in the Mid-Atlantic States in winter, and early spring when they migrate through here to their nesting areas.  Wigeons hatch ducklings in marshes in the western half of Canada and all of Alaska.  And they winter among ponds and fields in the western half of the United States and all of Mexico, and along the Atlantic sea coast from Rhode Island south to Florida and the Caribbean.  Thousand Acre Marsh and Bombay Hook Wildlife Refuge in Delaware are two marsh areas where wigeons often winter in good numbers, at least until the fresh water freezes.
     American wigeons are pretty in a plain way.  Drake wigeons are mostly light-brown with a black rear, a white crown and a broad, green stripe over each eye and back to the neck, which seems to be a mask appropriate for a robber.  Hens are brown all over, which allows them to blend into their habitats as they set on eggs and raise ducklings.
     American wigeons are lovely little ducks that have several strategies for survival.  They became bandits simply to get food, though we may deem them unfair to diving birds who work to get that bottom vegetation.  But there are other unfair practices in this world.