Blue-wing

Blue-wing, a kind of duck, either a sub-genus of Anas, or a special genus Cyanopterus. The latter title and the popular name refer to the conspicuous colour. The best-known species, the Common or Lunate Blue-wing (Anas or Cyanopterus discors), is generally called the Blue-winged Teal in the United States of America, where it is very abundant. Vast numbers spend the winter in the extensive marshes near the mouths of the Mississippi, to which they congregate both from the north and from the coast regions of the east; but the summer migrations of the species extend as far north as the 57th parallel, and it is plentiful on the Saskatchewan in the breeding-season. It breeds, however, also in the marshes of the south, even in Texas; and is common in Jamaica, where it is supposed to be not a mere bird of passage, but a permanent resident. In size it is rather larger than the common teal; in the summer plumage of the male, the upper part of the head is black, the other parts of the head are of a deep purplish blue, except a half-moon shaped patch of pure white before each eye; the prevalent colour of the rest of the plumage on the upper parts is brown mixed and glossed with green, except that the wings exhibit various shades of blue, the lesser wing-coverts being of a rich ultramarine blue, with an almost metallic lustre; the lower parts are reddish orange spotted with black; the tail is brown, its feathers short and pointed. The flight is extremely rapid and well sustained. The flocks are sometimes so numerous and so closely crowded together on the muddy marshes near New Orleans, that Audubon mentions having seen 84 killed by the simultaneous discharge of the two barrels of a double-barrelled gun. There are other species of blue-wing, also American; but this alone seems to visit the more northern regions. No member of the duck tribe is in higher esteem for the table, and it has therefore been suggested that the blue-wing is particularly worthy of domestication, of which it seems to be very easily susceptible.