BIRD CALLS and SONGS: Ducks I : Dabbling Ducks

Unlike most birds, male and female ducks have different calls.

The female Wood Duck has a loud call oo-eek often heard in times of agitation or in flight.
In flight (Mar, PA).

A group of 7 birds flying upstream with first female calls, followed by male calls (Mar, PA).

female call

male call

Female arriving at pond, setting off the male vocalizations (Apr, PA).

advertising calls at 15s

Advertising calls by female at dawn (Apr, PA).

coquette (BNA) call at 7s and 63s

There are two different commonly made male calls (Red-winged Blackbirds calling,Apr, PA)

A series of short squeaks (Apr, PA).

During displays, males make a squeaky chatter (Apr, PA)

Male and female calls, a group of birds, mostly males, in a flooded woodland (Apr, PA).

Female Wood Duck with young, the young heard peeping at the beginning of the cut, the female making a number of calls (May, ND).

peeping of chicks

female calls

purring call of female at 23s

American Wigeon, male and female calls. The American Wigeon male also has a squeaky call, but it is in two or three parts. The female has a growling call very similar to Aythya female calls (Redhead, scaup).
(Mar, NJ).

The Eurasian Wigeon male has a higher single-syllable call (Feb, DE).

A solitary quacking female Mallard (Apr, NJ). Persistent quacking occurs during nest-site selection.

Female decrescendo call (Dec, UK).

time scale reduced

Male Mallard "rhaib" calls. Male mallards do not quack (Nov, PA).

Male courtship whistles, a group of about 12 males and 6 females (Dec, PA).

Mallard courtship calls by a group of 7 males and 3 females, at dawn, with female "inciting" calls followed by a male whistle (Nov, PA).

inciting calls

whistle

Black Duck calls are the same those of Mallards.

Several Black Duck taking flight (Feb, NJ)

Three Black Duck in flight, female inciting calls (Jan, NJ)

Female inciting calls

Black Duck male courtship whistle (Jan, NJ)

Solitary quacking female (Jan, PA).

Mottled Duck calls are also same as Mallard (male, Feb, FL)

The male Gadwall has a short, nasal call, called a burp (May, ND).

During the "grunt-whistle" courtship display a whistle is added to the nasal call (Nov, NJ).

The female Gadwall (here in flight) has a quack similar to the female Mallard but harsher (May, ND).

The female Northern Pintail is another female duck with a quack-like call. This bird was with a male on a pond at Lostwood NWR in North Dakota (May).

Several thousand Northern Pintail congregate at Pedricktown Marsh in New Jersey in late winter. The males have a squeaky call and a brrp call (with Canada Goose, Feb, NJ).

On the sonagram there is a tent-like image of the squeaky call above each brrp.

Male burps with female rattling calls (Feb, DE).

The male Green-winged Teal has a brrp call similar to that of the Northern Pintail but a little higher (Feb, NV).

During courtship displays, higher whistles are heard along with the burps (Apr, NJ).

whistles at 5-6kHz

Calls by both sexes, burps and whistles by the males, quacks and a churring rattle by the females (Apr, NJ).

female rattle, higher than that of pintail

The female has a 4-7 part laughing or decrescendo call (Mar, NJ).

female and male calls

This female was barking (Mar, NJ).

Female Green-winged Teal calls, with male Green-winged Teal and Northern Pintail calls (compare the burps; male Gadwall towards end, Feb, DE)

Quiet calls by feeding Green-winged Teal (Feb, DE).

The female Blue-winged Teal (here in flight) has a bisyllabic quack (May, ND).

The Blue-winged Teal male has a pew courtship call (May, ND)

Three males with a female (peeps by males, low calls by female, Feb, FL)

A group of Blue-winged Teal in migration. As is typical with ducks, the male and female calls are dissimilar (Oct, NJ).
male call (similar to a soft Northern Shoveler male call)