The cinnamon teal (Spatula cyanoptera) is a species of duck found in western North and South America. It is a small dabbling duck, with bright reddish plumage on the male and duller brown plumage on the female. It lives in marshes and ponds, and feeds mostly on plants.
| Cinnamon teal | |
|---|---|
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| Spatula cyanoptera (male) | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Anseriformes |
| Family: | Anatidae |
| Genus: | Spatula |
| Species: | S. cyanoptera |
| Binomial name | |
| Spatula cyanoptera (Vieillot, 1816) | |
| Subspecies | |
|
4 living, 1 possibly extinct; see text | |
 | |
Breeding Migration Year-round Nonbreeding | |
| Synonyms | |
|
Anas cyanoptera Vieillot, 1816 | |
Description
The adult male has a cinnamon-red head and body with a brown back, a red eye and a dark bill. The adult female has a mottled brown body, a pale brown head, brown eyes and a grey bill and is very similar in appearance to a female blue-winged teal; however, its overall color is richer, the lores, eye line, and eye ring are less distinct. Its bill is longer and more spatulate. Male juvenile resembles a female cinnamon or blue-winged teal but their eyes are red.[2][3] They are 16 in (41 cm) long, have a 22-inch (560 mm) wingspan, and weigh 14 oz (400 g).[3] They have 2 adult molts per year and a third molt in their first year.[3]
Distribution
Their breeding habitat is marshes and ponds in western United States and extreme southwestern Canada, and are rare visitors to the east coast of the United States.[3] One young male duck was spotted in Grimsby, Ontario, and became a tourist attraction due to its rarity outside of western Canada.[4] Cinnamon teal generally select new mates each year. They are migratory and most winter in northern South America and the Caribbean,[5] generally not migrating as far as the blue-winged teal. Some winter in California and southwestern Arizona.[2] Two subspecies of cinnamon teal reside within the Andes of South America. The smaller sized S. c. cyanoptera is widespread within low elevations (<1000m) such as the coast of Peru and southern Argentina, whereas the larger size subspecies S. c. orinomus occupies elevations of 3500–4600 meters in the central Andes.[6]
Behavior
These birds feed by dabbling. They mainly eat plants; their diet may include molluscs and aquatic insects.
Taxonomy
They are known to interbreed with blue-winged teals,[2] which are very close relatives.
Subspecies are:
- Spatula cyanoptera septentrionalium (Oberholser, 1906) northern cinnamon teal breeds from British Columbia to northwestern New Mexico, and they winter in northwestern South America.[7]
- Spatula cyanoptera tropica (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) tropical cinnamon teal occurs in the Cauca Valley and Magdalena Valley in Colombia.[7]
- Spatula cyanoptera borreroi (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) Borrero's cinnamon teal (possibly extinct) occurs in the eastern Andes of Colombia with records of apparently resident birds from northern Ecuador.[7] It is named for Colombian ornithologist José Ignacio Borrero.
- Spatula cyanoptera orinoma (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) Andean cinnamon teal occurs in the Altiplano of Peru, northern Chile and Bolivia.[7]
- Spatula cyanoptera cyanoptera (Vieillot, 1816) Argentine cinnamon teal occurs in southern Peru, southern Brazil, Argentina, Chile, and the Falkland Islands.[7]
References
Works cited
External links
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