The shallows of the marsh slough were "alive" with ducks, swimming briskly, with heads half submerged. In one portion of the marsh I counted a circular cluster of 28 ducks "sloshing" around in the water as they swam in a circle. This is a practice known as "pinwheeling" They fed vigorously on particles of food kicked up by the paddling feet of their companions. Sometimes individuals would spin one way, then back, accomplishing the same thing for themselves. These are common feeding habits for one of our most unusual ducks—the duck with the funny bill—the northern shoveler.

     Shovelers are fairly easy to identify, although they are occasionally mistaken by the inexperienced as mallards due to the drake's dark green head and the hen's similar overall appearance to the hen mallard. However, upon closer examination we see very little resemblance. The shoveler is a rather small duck with a short-necked, pointed-wing appearance. During spring, the drake's dark green head, chestnut-red belly and sides, and a white chest are very distinctive.

     The female is basically grayish-buff in color with markings of dark brown and a light, buff-colored belly. It has a dark crown and eye stripe, and a head and neck streaked and spotted with dark brown. Both sexes have light blue shoulder patches with black and green speculums, similar to the blue-winged teal, and both sexes have bright orange feet.

     By far, the most outstanding feature of the shoveler is its large, spoon-like bill. Its bill's shape and its feeding habits have given rise to local nicknames such as spoonbill, spoony, loffel-ente (French for spoon duck), mud duck, scooper, shovel bill, and spoon-billed teal. Its scientific name, Spatula, is Latin meaning spoon, and clypeata, meaning shield.

     The shoveler's bill has very pronounced, comb-like "teeth," called lamellae, along the edges of its upper and lower mandibles. These lamellae are specially designed to feed in bottom debris of shallow waters or on the surface, with the purpose of straining out food particles. The roof and tongue of its bill have sensitive nerve endings, which enable the shoveler to touch and taste tiny invertebrates and microorganisms amid mud and other debris.

     This unique configuration makes the shoveler a most efficient feeder. The bird swims along with head half in the water, taking in small particles, tastes them, and then sifts out the unwanted, non food items, through the lamellae. The shoveler's intestine is more elongated, which apparently aids in proper digestion of its food types. Actually, most of the shoveler's diet is like other ducks, although it leans a little more toward animal matter. Aquatic insects and larvae, leeches, tiny clams, crustaceans, zooplankton, and fish make up one third of its diet with aquatic plants and seeds making up the majority.

     Normally, the shoveler is a warm weather duck, leaving the north by the end of October and not returning in spring until mid-April. They winter in the southern states along the South Atlantic Coast and the Gulf Coast through Mexico, where they seek out shallow inland waters. There is one particular population of shovelers that migrates some 2,000 miles between Alaska and the Hawaiian Islands. Many shovelers winter in the vicinity of the Chesapeake Bay, at the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries' Hog Island Wildlife Management Area near Surry, numerous marshes all through the Northern Neck, the Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge in Virginia Beach, and the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge on Eastern Shore.

     They will begin leaving their wintering grounds in late February or early March, reaching the most northerly limits of their breeding range in May, depending on weather and other conditions. They migrate in small flocks, visiting sloughs, marshes, ponds, slow-moving creeks, or flooded croplands. As they migrate toward, or once on, their breeding grounds, the shovelers perform a series of courtship displays, both in the air and on the water. Sometimes a group of drakes will chase a single hen through the air in a twisting, dipping, circling, erratic flight. On the water, drakes go through much head stretching and bill jerking in trying to impress the hen. Once she makes her choice, the ritual is often ended with a series of bows and bill dipping. 

     Shovelers favor the grasslands and prairie sloughs for nesting. They tend to return to almost the same spots they nested in the previous year. The nest is frequently in grasses, away from water, but wet, grassy, slough edges are favored. From six to 14 pale, olive-buff eggs are laid in a grassy depression that is lined with down. When shoveler ducklings hatch, 21-23 days later, they could pass for any other duckling. However, after 10 days or so, the distinctive spatula-shaped bill reveals whose young they are!  While the females are incubating, the males remain in loafing or waiting areas to maintain the pair bond with their mates and to protect the nest and chase single males from the female. Once the eggs hatch and the female leads the young to a water area, the males leave and gather in a protected, undisturbed area to molt. In this "eclipse" stage, they resemble the hens but retain a little of their chestnut belly patch. They remain patchy looking through the late fall and regain their breeding plumage in late December.

     They sit low on the water with bill pointing downward on an angle as if too heavy to hold up. As all puddle ducks, shovelers are capable of flying directly into the air with one downbeat of their wings, and when startled, will fly erratically—somewhat like teal—often making sudden downward movements. Ordinarily, they fly steady, direct and fairly slow. Even in flight they seem to carry their bill in a downward slant, although it may just be the oversize bill that makes it appear so. In flight, its wings seem to be set back on its chunky body and they are noticeably pointed. Shovelers take a deeper, pigeon-like wing beat than most ducks.
Most shovelers taken by hunters are usually shot incidental to hunting other ducks. Since they are small, weighing about a pound to a pound and a half, and their flesh is rated only fair to good, they are not favored by most hunters. They decoy readily and have the suicidal habit of circling and returning to the decoys even after having been shot at.

     Shovelers are among the most widely distributed of all ducks. They and their counterparts inhabit all continents of North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, South America, and Australia. In North America, it breeds from Alaska and Northwest Territories east to Hudson Bay, and south to around the Great Lakes and North Central States. They are most numerous in the Central and Pacific Flyways. 

Artwork by Spike Knuth © 2003 All Rights Reserved
Northern Shovelers © 2003 Spike Knuth All Rights Reserved
 

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