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The Canvasback Duck Society
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Thank you for visiting the Canvasback Duck Society. We are a non profit, public service organization. We are all volunteers. All our revenues go to improving the site. No one has ever taken a salary. Please scroll down to learn more.

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Canvasback Ducks
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The Canvasback (Aythya valisineria) is a wild duck that is found only in North America. It is a favorite of hunters, as it is delicious to eat if it has itself eaten the right food. Canvasbacks take their specific name from an aquatic plant, called wild celery, or Vallisneria americana, which is one of the foods that impart an excellent flavour to this game bird.

Distribution
The map shows the Canvasback's main breeding range in central Canada (mainly Alberta and Saskatchewan) and the northern United States. A lesser number of individuals breeds as far north as the Alaskan interior. Breeding pairs have been found as far east as Shoal Lake and Lake Manitoba; west to Grand Forks, British Columbia; south to Cimarron, New Mexico; and north to Fort Yukon, Alaska, and the Anderson River, in the Northwest Territories.

Canvasbacks winter mainly along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the United States and south to about 20°N. Typically, large numbers of these birds winter in the coastal regions of southern Maryland and Virginia.

Relatives
The genus Aythya to which the Canvasback belongs includes 12 species, five of which occur in North America. These are the Canvasback, Redhead, Greater Scaup, Lesser Scaup, and Ring-necked Duck. Generally, all Aythya species have rounded bodies with large feet, legs set back on the body, and a broad bill. They are all diving ducks.

Appearance
The adult male is a large white-bellied, grey-backed duck with a black chest, sloping forehead, and ruddy chestnut head and neck. The adult female is about the same size and has the same sloping forehead and long bill. She is less colourful and thus more able to blend into her surroundings as she incubates her eggs and rears her young. She is white-bellied with a pale brown back and reddish brown head, neck, and chest. Male and female Canvasbacks resemble Redheads and Ring-necked Ducks of the corresponding sex, but can be distinguished from them by their longer black bills and less abrupt foreheads.

In early autumn, the young of both sexes resemble adult females, although their breast plumage is more mottled and their back plumage is darker. During November, the young males begin to resemble the adult males, and by February the adult plumage of both sexes has almost completely grown in.

Divers and dabblers
Wild ducks feed either by dabbling on the surface of the water, or by diving below the surface. Although Canvasbacks dabble at times, they are diving ducks because they usually dive for their food and because, like other divers, they have a special lobe on their hind toe that they use like a paddle in the water.

Diet
Canvasbacks usually feed by diving in water 2 to 9 m deep, but occasionally they dabble in shallow areas with surface-feeding ducks, especially American Wigeon. Their diet includes about 80% aquatic plants, primarily pondweeds, wild celery, duck potato, wild rice, banana water lily, and milfoils. Animal material consumed includes molluscs, insects, and various fish. Feeding generally occurs during the day, although Canvasbacks sometimes feed at night.

Flight
The Canvasback is one of the most powerful fliers among ducks, capable of speeds of 120 km per hour. During migration, Canvasbacks usually fly high up in V-shaped flocks. On their winter feeding grounds, they often form small compact flocks and fly about for pleasure, especially in the early morning and the late afternoon. Their wings create a loud whirring noise.

When taking off from the water, Canvasbacks patter along the surface for some distance before becoming airborne. The Canvasback is an awkward bird on land due to its large size, short legs, and webbed feet.

Courtship and nesting
By mid-February, courtship activities have begun. Commonly, several males court one or two females. A bright plumage helps a drake to attract a mate. A courting male throws his head back until the crown almost touches the tail feathers, then brings his head forward and utters a moaning, almost dove-like, ik-ik-cooo cry. The female answers with a low quacking cuk-cuk. At other times the amorous drake performs the kinked-neck display, in which the neck is stretched and bent forward momentarily.

Canvasbacks do not mate for life. Pairs form in late winter or during migration in early spring, and the female leads her mate to a nest site, usually near where she was reared. This species nests late, usually about 30 May in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.

Canvasbacks commonly build their nests near open water in the shallows of large sloughs, among cattails, bulrushes, and reeds. The nest is a large, bulky structure made of reeds and sedges and lined with drab brown down plucked from the female's body. As incubation proceeds, the layer of down thickens into an insulating blanket, which the female uses to cover the eggs when she leaves the nest.

As soon as the females have laid their 7-9 eggs, the males desert their mates and gather in large flocks on lakes and larger sloughs to moult. For two weeks, the males are unable to fly to escape predators due to loss of their flight feathers, and their plumage changes colour to look like that of the females (which is more effective camouflage), while they wait for new flight feathers to grow in.

The burden of incubating the eggs and rearing the brood falls on the females alone, and hens younger than 5 years old are frequently unsuccessful. The drab green or grayish olive eggs must be incubated for 24-28 days. A day or two after the eggs have hatched, the ducklings must be led safely to open water to find their own food, usually drifting plant material. The young do not develop feathers until about the fifth week, and are unable to fly until about 11 weeks.

Migration
In late summer, the females and young join the males. Family units split up in the early fall, and the young may or may not migrate with their parents. The southern migration is well under way by mid-October. Migrating flocks normally contain about 100 birds, but flocks often converge at traditional feeding areas along the migration route, resulting in assemblages of many thousand individuals.

Canvasbacks Free Travel Info along three major migration corridors, or flyways. Canvasbacks that nest in the central and eastern prairies migrate southeastwards to wintering areas along the Atlantic coast, primarily in Virginia and Maryland. This is the largest group, and these migrants head across Lake St. Clair and Lake Erie, either continuing south through the Finger Lakes of New York or flying eastwards to the eastern end of Lake Ontario before turning south. Small flocks belonging to this population migrate through the Montreal region, where they are relatively easy to observe. Another group of Canvasbacks moves from the central prairies to the northern tributaries of the Mississippi River, following the river valley to the Gulf of Mexico. The smallest group migrates from breeding grounds in western Alberta, interior British Columbia, and central Alaska to wintering grounds along the Pacific coast.

Adult males and young seem to congregate in large flocks during migration, whereas adult females appear to migrate along a broad front and are not common anywhere. The routes followed by migrating Canvasbacks have changed in the last century. Although few Canvasbacks were observed in Massachusetts or Maryland prior to 1895, the species is now common there. Large numbers of Canvasbacks now congregate on the navigation pools of the upper Mississippi River where few were previously observed. Sometimes, especially in the fall, individuals wander well beyond traditional migration routes: on rare occasions, Canvasbacks have been observed at Moosonee, Ontario, in eastern Quebec, in New Brunswick, in Nova Scotia, and in Bermuda.

During the nonbreeding period, Canvasbacks spend their time on open water in huge "rafts," or floating flocks, which may extend for several kilometres in larger lakes and bays.

The northern migration, from wintering to breeding ground, occurs in early spring. In most years, some migrants return to southern Ontario by late February and to southern Manitoba by mid-April.

Life spans of Canvasbacks are poorly known, but individuals aged 10 and 19 years have been recorded.

the Canvasback is so delicious, it is sought after by hunters. Before it became illegal to sell wild game, hundreds of Canvasbacks were taken daily using weapons, such as punt guns, and methods, such as night shooting, that have since been outlawed. Today, hunters use large flocks of 50-100 decoys to attract these curious trusting birds. This technique is especially effective early in the hunting season.

In the last 40 years, Canvasback populations have fluctuated from about 500,000 in the mid 1950s to about 200,000 in the early 1990s. In an attempt to ensure that populations remain healthy, the Canadian and American governments regulate hunting carefully. The Canadian Wildlife Service and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, in conjunction with provincial and state wildlife agencies, conduct surveys to determine total numbers of ducks and the annual hunting kill.

Restrictive hunting regulations are not enough to ensure healthy populations. Loss of habitat and periodic droughts on the breeding grounds cause declines in populations of this and other species. Loss of habitat is the result of the draining of wetlands by farmers and developers and the use of vast expanses of former breeding range to grow crops. In addition, wintering range has been reduced in quality. For example, Chesapeake Bay, Maryland, no longer supports the wide range of plants that wintering Canvasbacks once fed upon.

Concern for the Canvasback and other wild ducks and geese that nest in prairie wetlands has prompted the various federal, provincial, and state wildlife agencies to cooperate in programs called "habitat joint ventures" under the North American Waterfowl Management Plan, or NAWMP. Programs to enhance wetlands used by ducks and geese have been initiated in Canada, the United States, and Mexico.